3  1822019593003 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF 
CALIFORNIA 

SAN  01  EGO 


..in 


presented  to  the 
UNIVERSITY  LIBRARY 
UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
SAN  DIEGO 

by 

MRS.   LEO  HERZ 


THE  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

NSW  YORK  •    BOSTON   •    CHICAGO 
DALLAS  •    SAN   FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LIMITBD 

LONDON  •    BOMBAY  •    CALCUTTA 

MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OF  CANADA,  LTD. 

TORONTO 


THE 

GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN 

CITIES 


Br 
WILLIAM  BENNETT  MUNRO,  PH.D.,  LL.B. 

PROFESSOR   OF   MUNICIPAL    GOVERNMENT 
IN   HARVARD    UNIVERSITY 


Neto  ffotfc 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 
1913 

All  rights  reserved 


COPTKIOIIT,    1912, 

BT  THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.    Published  November,  1919.    Reprinted 
January,  April,  1913. 


NortoooB 

J.  8.  Gushing  Co.  —  Berwick  A  Smith  Co. 
Norwood,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


"Municipal  institutions  constitute  the  strength  of  free 
nations.  A  nation  may  establish  a  system  of  free  govern- 
ment, but  without  municipal  institutions  it  cannot  have  the 
spirit  of  liberty." 

—  ALEXIS  DK  TOCQUEVILLE,  Democracy  in  America,  i,  76. 


PKEFACE 

THE  aim  of  this  volume  is  to  describe,  in  a  summary 
way,  the  machinery  of  city  government  in  the  United 
States.  In  its  various  chapters  an  endeavor  has  been 
made  to  outline  the  growth  of  American  cities,  to  explain 
the  present-day  powers  and  duties  of  the  city  as  a  municipal 
corporation,  to  describe  the  different  organs  of  municipal 
government,  and  to  make  clear  the  relations  which  these 
bear  to  one  another.  The  book  deals  with  government 
rather  than  with  administration,  with  the  framework  rather 
than  with  the  functioning  mechanism  of  the  municipal 
organization.  This  is  not  because  the  latter  is  in  any  sense 
regarded  as  the  less  important  of  the  two ;  but  merely 
because  it  is  proposed  to  deal  fully  with  that  phase  of  the 
subject  in  a  later  volume. 

Even  as  respects  governmental  organization,  moreover, 
no  attempt  has  been  made  to  cover  every  point  in  full 
detail.  I  have  tried  to  do  no  more  than  to  provide,  both 
for  the  college  student  of  municipal  government  and  for  the 
general  reader,  an  introduction  to  the  study  of  a  very  large 
and  important  subject.  Those  who  desire  more  definite  or 
more  extensive  information  than  the  text  contains  will  find 
some  suggestions  at  the  end  of  each  chapter. 

In  an  age  when  men  appear  far  too  ready  to  proceed 
with  a  diagnosis  and  to  prescribe  remedies  without  much 
preliminary  study  of  the  anatomy  and  the  physiology  of 
city  government,  too  much  stress  upon  the  importance  of 
the  latter  branches  of  the  subject  can  scarcely  be  laid.  At 
any  rate  we  have  heard  so  much  in  recent  years  concerning 

what  the  government  of  American  cities  ought  to  be  that  an 

vii 


yiii  PREFACE 

apology  is  hardly  necessary  for  the  emphasis  which  this 
volume  places  upon  what  their  government  really  is. 

Dealing  as  they  do  with  institutions  that  are  continually 
in  process  of  change,  these  chapters  must  inevitably  contain 
some  mis-statements  of  fact  and  many  errors  of  opinion. 
I  hope  that  they  are  no  more  numerous  than  the  complex- 
ities of  the  subject  render  pardonable.  In  any  event  I  am 
deeply  grateful  for  the  generous  assistance  that  has  been 
given  me  from  various  sources  in  securing  the  data  neces- 
sary for  the  writing  of  the  book.  To  Professors  Merriam, 
Fairlie,  Hatton,  and  Hormell  I  am  under  obligations  for  their 
kindness  in  reading  portions  of  the  proof  and  for  many 
useful  suggestions.  Dr.  Adna  F.  Weber  of  New  York  and 
Mr.  Charles  Warren  of  Boston  were  also  kind  enough  to 
give  me  the  benefit  of  their  counsel  on  several  difficult 
points.  To  the  Hon.  John  A.  Sullivan,  Chairman  of  the 
Boston  Finance  Commission  I  am  glad  to  express  my 
gratitude  for  keeping  me  clear  of  many  pitfalls  and  for 
the  privilege  of  drawing  so  freely  upon  his  comprehensive 
store  of  sure  information  on  all  matters  relating  to  the 
practical  workings  of  American  government.  Miss  A.  F. 
Rowe  and  Miss  Alice  Holden  of  Cambridge  have  given 
loyal  assistance  in  the  preparation  of  the  manuscript  for 
the  press. 

WILLIAM   BENNETT  MUNRO. 

October  1, 1912. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  FACT 

I.    AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT        ....  1 

II.    THE  SOCIAL  STRUCTURE  OP  THE  CITY      ....  29 

III.  THE  CITY  AND  THE  STATE .53 

IV.  MUNICIPAL  POWERS  AND  RESPONSIBILITIES       ...  80 
V.    THE  MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE 102 

VI.    MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND  ELECTIONS         .       .       .  125 

VII.    MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND  POLITICS 153 

VIII.    THE  CITY  COUNCIL 180 

IX.    THE  MAYOR 207 

X.    THE  ADMINISTRATIVE  DEPARTMENTS          ....  237 

XI.    MUNICIPAL  OFFICIALS  AND  EMPLOYEES     .        .        .        .  265 

XII.    CITY  GOVERNMENT  BY  A  COMMISSION       ....  294 

XIII.  DIRECT  LEGISLATION  AND  THE  RECALL     ....  321 

XIV.  MUNICIPAL  REFORM  AND  REFORMERS       ....  358 

INDEX  .  386 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN 
CITIES 


AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT 

THE  mastery  of  any  field  of  political  science  involves 
some  knowledge  of  institutional  history.  Only  by  know- 
ing, at  least  in  a  general  way,  what  has  gone  before  can  one 
grasp  the  motives  that  have  guided  a  people  to  its  con- 
temporary political  machinery,  whether  national  or  local; 
and  only  thereby  can  one  reach  a  proper  understanding  of 
what  future  development  the  political  features  of  a  coun- 
try are  likely  to  have.  American  municipal  institutions, 
of  one  form  or  another,  have  now  put  behind  them  two 
and  a  quarter  centuries  of  history.  This  history  covers  a 
great  variety  of  experiments  in  local  government;  there 
is  scarcely  a  feature  of  popular  administration  that  has 
not  at  some  time  been  tried  in  one  or  more  of  our  cities  or 
towns.  The  countries  of  Europe  have  not  made  great 
changes  in  their  machinery  of  municipal  government  dur- 
ing the  past  half-century;  in  this  field  America  has  been 
the  world's  chief  laboratory  for  political  experimentation. 
Though  costly,  the  experiments  have  been  instructive,  and 
have  in  the  end  led  to  notable  improvements  in  the  admin- 
istration of  municipal  affairs.  By  a  study  of  the  steps 
through  which  the  present  framework  of  American  city 


2  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

government  has  been  evolved  one  may  come  to  understand 
the  chief  features  which  characterize  it  at  the  present  day. 
Boroughs  The  beginnings  of  the  American  municipal  system  are 
colonial  era  to  be  found  in  the  incorporation  of  the  colonial  boroughs 
during  the  latter  half  of  the  seventeenth  century,..  In  this 
New  York  was  the  pioneer,  receiving  its  first  city  charter 
from  Governor  Dongan  in  1686.1  Albany  followed  a  few 
months  later  in  the  same  year,  its  first  charter  being  sub- 
stantially the  same  as  that  granted  to  New  York.  Both 
charters  continued  in  force  until  the  Revolution.  Other 
rising  colonial  towns  received  similar  recognition  in  due 
course,  —  Philadelphia  in  169 1,2  Annapolis  in  1696,3  Nor- 
folk in  1736,4  Richmond  in  1742,6  and  Trenton,  the  last  of 
the  colonial  list,  in  1746.6  A  dozen  others  of  less  impor- 
tance scattered  through  the  Middle  and  Southern  colonies 
also  obtained  their  charters  during  this  interval.  There 
were  no  active  chartered  boroughs  in  the  New  fin^anrl 
colonies,  for  there  the  system  of  town  government  seemed 
to  be  sufficient  and  satisfactory.7  In  Massachusetts  no  city 

1  A  burgher  government,  after  the  model  of  that  maintained  in  the  free 
cities  of  Holland,  had  been  established  by  Governor  Stuyvesant  in  1653 ;  but 
in  1665  the  town  passed  into  English  hands  and  the  government  was  changed 
to  that  of  an  English  municipal  corporation,  though  no  formal  charter  was 
issued.  Dongan  granted  a  formal  document  in  1686  at  the  request  of  the 
mayor  and  aldermen  of  the  town.  This  charter,  which  in  its  printed  form 
covers  only  fourteen  pages,  is  still  preserved  in  the  archives  of  the  comp- 
troller in  New  York  City.  A  copy  may  be  found  in  the  Colonial  Laws  of 
New  York  (5  vols.,  New  York,  1897),  1. 181.  Some  doubts  having  arisen  as 
to  the  validity  of  this  charter,  it  was  reissued  under  the  royal  seal  in  1730. 
This  confirmation,  which  made  no  very  important  changes,  is  commonly 
known  as  the  Montgomery  charter.  It  may  be  found  ibid.,  II.  575. 

*  The  Philadelphia  charter  of  1691  was  replaced  by  a  new  one,  granted 
by  Perm  in  1701,  which  remained  in  operation  till  1776. 

*  David  Ridgely,  Annals  of  Annapolis  (Baltimore,  1841),  89. 

4  Virginia  Statutes  at  Large  (ed.  W.  W.  Hening,  13  vols.,  New  York,  etc., 
1819-1823),  IV.  541. 

6  Ibid.,  XI.  45.      •  New  Jersey  Historical  Society,  Proceedings,  IX.  152. 

7  Sir  Fernando  Gorges  gave  borough  charters  to  Agamenticus  and 
Kittery,  two  Maine  hamlets,  in  1641  and  1647  respectively;    but  no 


AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT  3 

charter  was  granted  prior  to  the  Boston  charter  of  1822, 
and  this  change  was  made  only  because  the  community 
had  become  too  populous  to  be  any  longer  governed  as  a 
town,  and  not  because  new  corporate  powers  were  needed ; l 
for  the  New  England  town  had,  without  any  specific  grant, 
substantially  all  the  powers  and  privileges  that  a  borough 
charter  could  confer.2  The  town  required  no  charter  to 
give  it  powers,  and  desired  none  to  set  limitations  upon  local 
freedom. 

From  first  to  last  the  governors  of  the  thirteen  colonies  charters 
gave  charters  to  twenty  boroughs,  or  cities,  as  some  places  Revolution, 
were  called  from  the  outset.3     Fifteen  of  these  were  places 
of  considerable  importance.     It  will  be  noticed  that  the 
charters  were  given  by  the  governors  and  not  by  the  colonial 
legislatures,  a  local  adaptation  of  the  practice  existing  in. 
England,  where  the  incorporation  of  boroughs  was  always 
made  by  royal  grant  rather  than  by  act  of  Parliament. 
The  governor  apparently  acted  upon  the  request  of  the 

municipal  governments  appear  to  have  been  organized  under  these 
grants.  These  charters  may  be  found  in  Ebenezer  Hazard's  Historical 
Collections  (2  vols.,  Philadelphia,  1792-1794),  I.  470,  480. 

1  The  population  of  Boston  in  1822  had  passed  the  40,000  mark,  and 
the  qualified  voters  numbered  about  7000.  "When  a  town-meeting  was 
held  on  any  exciting  subject  in  Faneuil  Hall,  those  only  who  obtained 
places  near  the  moderator  could  even  hear  the  discussion.  A  few  busy  or 
Interested  individuals  easily  obtained  the  management  of  the  most  im- 
portant affairs,  in  an  assembly  in  which  the  greater  number  could  have 
neither  voice  nor  hearing.  When  the  subject  was  not  generally  exciting, 
town-meetings  were  usually  composed  of  the  selectmen,  the  town  officers, 
and  thirty  or  forty  inhabitants."  —  JOSIAH  QUINCY,  Municipal  History  of 
Boston  (Boston,  1852),  28. 

z  The  powers  which  the  New  England  towns  possessed  without  any 
formal  act  of  incorporation  are  best  set  forth  in  the  case  of  Hill  v.  Boston, 
122  Mass.  344.  See  also  J.  F.  Dillon,  The  Law  of  Municipal  Corporations 
(5th  ed.,  5  vols.,  Boston,  1911). 

8  The  list,  with  dates  of  grant  and  details,  may  be  found  in  J.  A.  Fairlie's 
Essays  in  Municipal  Administration  (New  York,  1908),  ch.  iv. ;  also  in 
an  essay  on  "Municipal  Corporations,  1701-1901, "  by  H.W.  Rogers,  in  Two 
Centuries'  Growth  of  American  Law  (Yale  Bicentennial  Publications,  New 
York,  1901),  203-260. 


4  GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 

burgesses,  or  inhabitants,  and  the  charters  were  sometimes 
submitted  to  the  latter  for  their  acceptance  before  being  put 
into  operation.  In  the  drafting  of  these  charters  no  single 
model  was  followed.  In  general,  however,  all  the  boroughs 
were  provided  with  a  frame  of  government  which  approxi- 
mated that  of  the  English  municipal  corporation  in  the  days 
before  the  epoch  of  reform.  In  each  case  provision  was 
made  for  a  governing  body,  to  which  were  given  the  cor- 
porate powers  of  the  community.  This  governing  body, 
usually  styled  "the  Mayor,  Aldermen,  and  Commonalty" 
of  the  borough,  consisted  of  a  single  council  made  up  of  a 
mayor,  a  small  number  of  aldermen,  and  a  larger  number 
of  councilmen,  all  sitting  together.  Except  in  the  threes 
close  corporations.  Annapolis.  Norfolk,  and  Philadelphia,  the 
councilmen  were  chosen  at  regular  intervals  by  popular  vote, 
and  so  were  the  aldermen,  as  a  rule ;  but  the  mayor  was., 
commonly  named  by  the  governor  of  the  colony.  There 
were,  in  addition,  some  other  borough  officers,  such  as  the 
recorder  and  the  treasurer.  None  of  these  had  to  perform 
burdensome  administrative  tasks;  for  the  boroughs  were 
small,  and  provided  for  their  inhabitants  no  public  services 
of  account.  Boston  was,  from  its  foundation  in  1630  until 
after  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  most  popu- 
lous community  in  the  New  World.  Philadelphia  then 
took  the  lead,  and  retained  it  till  after  the  Revolution.1 
On  the  eve  of  the  Revolutionary  War  there  were  only  five 
cities  and  towns  with  populations  exceeding  8000,  and  the 
combined  strength  of  these  was  less  than  100,000.2  When 
it  is  remembered  that  these  five  places  contained  less  than 
three  per  cent  of  the  total  population  of  the  thirteen  colonies, 

1  In  1700  the  population  of  Boston  was  6700,  of  Philadelphia  4400,  of 
New  York  about  4500.  In  1760  the  figures  stood,  Philadelphia  18,756, 
Boston  15,631,  and  New  York  about  14,000.  See  Bureau  of  the  Census, 
A  Century  of  Population  Growth,  1790-1900  (Washington,  1909),  11-12. 

1  Philadelphia,  New  York,  Boston,  Charleston,  and  Newport. 


the  large  part  which  their  citizens  took  in  the  military  and 
political  events  of  the  war  period  becomes  the  more  remark- 
able. Even  at  this  time  the  urban  population  was  doing 
more  than  its  proportionate  share  in  moulding  the  course 
of  national  development. 

The  successful  outcome  of  the  Revolution  and  the  adop-  Effects 
tion  of  the  new  state  constitutions  served  to  bring  about  tion. 
great  changes  in  both  the  form  and  the  spirit  of  municipal 
government.  Municipal  charters  were  henceforth  granted, 
not  by  the  governor  alone,  but  by  the  state  legislature.  In 
other  words,  the  cjt,y  p.hfl,rter  became  a  statute^  which  mighj. 
be  amended  or  repealed  like  anv  other  statute.  This  in- 
volved a  radical  change  in  the  relation  existing  between  the 
municipality  and  the  state.  Under  the  regime  of  roval 
charters  the  municipalities  enjoyed  almost  entire  fre^om 
from  legislative  interference  f  under  the  new  disptvn  action 
they  were  completely  under  the  domination  of  tfoft  ptfl.tft 
legislature.  With  the  aftermath  of  the  Revolution,  accord- 
ingly, one  finds  the  way  thrown  open  for  that  virtual  extinc- 
tion of  municipal  home  rule  which  characterized  the  situation 
in  American  cities  during  the  latter  half  of  the  nineteenth 
century.1 

Some  of  the  boroughs  that  had  received  charters  before  charters 
1775  abandoned  them  after   the  Revolution  and  received  Revolution, 
new  grants  from  the  legislatures  of  their  respective  states. 
These   new   municipal   constitutions   differed   considerably 
from  the  old  ones.     The  old  idea  of  the  borough  as  a  "  close 
corporation"  was   discarded,    for  instance,  the  new  order 
resting  upon  the  idea  that  admission  to  citizenship  should 
be  made  easy  and  that  the  officials  of  borough  government 
should  be  elected.     The  charter  of  Philadelphia  issued  in 
1789  affords  a  good  example  of  the  change  which  was  taking 

1  See  below,  pp.  71-72. 


6  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES  % 

place  in  the  spirit  of  municipal  government.1  By  its  pro- 
visions the  government  of  the  city  was  vested  in  the  hands 
of  the  mayor,  aldermen,  and  common  councillors,  silftting 
together  in  one  body.  Fifteen  aldermen  were  to  be  eM?ted 
for  a  seven-year  term  by  the  owners  of  freehold,  property, 
and  thirty  common-councilmen  were  to  be  chosen  for  a 
three-year  term  by  the  "freemen."  These  together  made 
up  the  city  council.  The  mayor  was  to  be  chosen  by  the 
aldermen  from  among  their  own  number,  his  post  to  be  no 
more  than  that  of  a  presiding  officer.  Such  officials  as 
might  from  time  to  time  be  found  necessary  were  to  be 
chosen  by  the  council. 

The  decade  in  which  this  charter  was  granted  has  been 
very  properly  termed  the  critical  period  of  American  his- 
tory. In  municipal  development  it  was  a  time  of  special 
crisis,  an  epoch  of  transition  from  the  old  English  to  the 
new  American  type  of  urban  government.  The  disap- 
pearance of  political  privilege  and  the  making  of  local  gov.- 
ernmftnt.  essentially  representative  are  the  outstanding 
features  of  the  Philadelphia  documenfc.  In  the  frame  of 
government  which  it  provided  only  slight  departures  from 
the  English  model  were  made.  Other  city  charters  of  the 
period  were  of  the  same  general  type,  diverging  more  in 
spirit  than  in  form  from  those  of  the  colonial  era.  They 
paved  the  way,  however,  for  the  charters  which  came  at 
the  threshold  of  the  new  century,  and  which  embodied 
the  more  important  ideas  concerning  governmental  organi- 
zation that  had  been  recognized  in  the  national  and  state 
constitutions, 
influence  of  In  these  constitutions  two  or  three  salient  features  stand 

the  federal  „,    . 

analogy.        out   prominently.     Chief   among  them,   of   course,   is   the 

1  The  charter  of  1789  is  printed  in  Laws  of  the  Commonwealth  of  Penn- 
sylvania (ed.  A.  J.  Dallas,  2  vols.,  Philadelphia,  1793-1797).  A  summary 
of  its  provisions  is  given  by  E.  P.  Allison  and  Boies  Penrose,  History  of 
Philadelphia  (Philadelphia,  1887),  6O-62. 


AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT  7 

principle  of  divided  powers,  or  of  checks  and  balances,  — 
mother  words,  the  doctrine  that  executive  and  legislative 
y  should  be  vested  in  separate  and  independent 
hajt^.  ,  Other  features  that  may  be  regarded  as  corollaries 
totEE  fundamental  axiom  were  the  use  of  the  executive 
veto,  Vie  establishment  of  double-chambered  legislatures, 
and  tha  intrusting  of  some  executive  functions  to  the  upper 
of  these'  two  chambers.  Since  these  new  and  native  prin- 
ciples of  political  organization  were  sanctioned  in  the  organic 
laws  of  s^ate  and  nation,  it  was  only  natural  that  they 
should  maKE  their  way  into  the  organic  laws  of  the  cities. 
The  dominating  factor  in  the  development  of  municipal 
framework  during  the  first,  quarter  of  the  nineteenth  century 
was,  accordingly,  the  influence  of  the  federal  analogy. 
The  charters  represented  the  attempt,  on  the  part  of  those 
who  framed  them,  to  impose  upon  the  cities  a  miniature  of 
that  plan  which  on  a  broader  scale  had  won  the  confidence 
of  the  electorate.  Excellent  examples  of  this  procedure 
may  be  found  in  the  Baltimore  charter  of  1796  *  and  the 
Detroit  charter  of  1806.  In  Baltimore  provision  was  made 
for  the  election  of  the  mayor  by  an  electoral  college,  and  for 
a  two-chambered  city  council,  one  branch  exactly  repre- 
senting the  eight  wards  of  the  city  by  giving  them  two 
aldermen  each,  the  other  representing  the  citizens  at  large. 
Although  in  the  distribution  of  powers  the  national  model 
was  not  exactly  followed,  the  influence  of  this  analogy  upon 
the  general  make-up  of  city  government  is  clearly  apparent. 
American  municipal  development  had  taken  a  course  of  its 
own,  cutting  somewhat  adrift  from  earlier  English  influences. 

It  long  since  became  apparent  to  thoughtful  men  that  its  effect 
this  radical  swerve  was  unwise  in  its  day  and  unfortunate  nidpai  gc 
in  its  consequences.     No  one  will  deny,  of  course,  that  the 
framers  of  the  national  constitution  had  defensible  ground 

1  Laws  of  Maryland,  1796,  ch.  68. 


8  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

for  the  recognition  which  they  gave,  in  their  great  work, 
to  the  principle  of  divorcing  administrative  from  legislative 
functions,  and  for  their  action  in  establishing  a  bicameral 
legislature.  Nor  are  the  framers  of  the  state  constitu$bns 
to  be  criticised  for  having  followed  along  the  sp,me  lines. 
Although  a  century  of  experience  has  led  many  to  the  belief 
that,  as  a  working  principle  of  government,  the  much- 
vaunted  doctrine  of  separation  of  powers  is  a  delusion  and  a 
snare,  yet  in  the  days  when  it  first  gained  recognition  in 
American  state  and  national  administration  there  were 
many  convincing  arguments  of  a  practical  sort  that  could 
be  put  forward  in  its  behalf.  In  the  field  of  municipal 
government,  however,  the  doctrine  of  divided  powers  never 
had  a  single  sound  prop  to  rest  upon.  Its  chief  professed 
virtue,  that  of  providing  a  bulwark  against  executive  or 
legislative  usurpations  to  the  detriment  of  civil  liberty, 
can  have  relevance  only  in  dealings  with  an  ultimate  po- 
litical power.  Those  who  design  the  structure  of  subordi- 
nate governments  need  not  make  the  liberty  of  the  subject 
their  first  care;  that  is  the  responsibility  of  those  who 
mould  the  frame  of  higher  authority  in  state  and  nation. 
If  these  have  done  their  work  rightly,  the  subordination  of 
municipal  to  state  government  deprives  the  former  of  all 
the  elements  of  permanent  danger.  But  that  was  not  the 
viewpoint  of  those  who  framed  American  city  charters  in 
the  quarter-century  following  the  establishment  of  the 
federal  constitution.  The  principle  of  administrative  and 
legislative  autonomy  became  a  fetich;  it  gained  ready 
recognition  everywhere,  and  determined  the  main  channel 
of  later  municipal  development.  The  autonomous  mayor- 
alty, the  bicameral  council,  the  executive  veto,  and  the 
practice  of  aldermanic  confirmation,  —  all  of  them  native 
institutions,  and  all  attributable  to  the  influence  of  national 
theories  upon  local  government,  —  made  their  appearance 


9 

before  the  period  closed.  The  first  charter  of  Boston, 
adopted  in  1822,  with  its  provision  for  a  mayor  directly 
elected  by  the  voters,  shows  quite  clearly  another  positive 
drift  of  the  age.1 

During  this  period  (1790-1825)  the  cities  of  the  United  Growth  of 

cities  after 

States  had  made  notable  progress  in  number,  in  popula-  the  Revoiu. 
tion,  and  in  the  scope  of  their  municipal  activities.  In  a 
new  country,  as  an  authoritative  writer  on  the  distribution 
of  population  has  pointed  out,  the  rapid  growth  of  cities 
is  both  natural  and  necessary;  for  no  efficient  industrial 
organization  of  a  new  settlement  is  possible  unless  there 
are  industrial  centres  to  carry  on  the  work  of  assembling 
and  distributing  goods.2  In  1790  there  were  but  five  com- 
munities in  the  country  with  populations  exceeding  8000,  — 
namely,  New  York,  Philadelphia,  Boston,  Baltimore,  and 
Charleston.  These  together  contained  slightly  more  than 
130,000  inhabitants,  or  less  than  three  and  one-half  per 
cent  of  the  nation's  population.  In  1820  the  number  of 
cities  with  8000  people  or  more  had  nearly  trebled ;  there 
were  now  thirteen,  containing  together  nearly  half  a  million 
inhabitants.  New  York,  the  largest  of  them,  had  passed 
the  100,000 .  mark,  and  was  expending  an  annual  budget 
amounting  to  about  a  dollar  per  capita.  Boston  on  its 
admission  to  cityhood  in  1822  contained  over  40,000  in- 
habitants, a  number  which  rendered  the  continuance  of  the 
town-meeting  a  physical  impossibility. 

Growth    in    population    brought    serious    beginnings    in  The   begin- 
municipal  services.     In  1825  New  York  had  the  rudiments  municipal 
of  a  police  system,  the  city  being  divided  into  three  dis- 

1  Laws  of  Massachusetts,  1822,  ch.  110.     As  pointed  out  by  Professor 
J.  H.  Beale  some  years  ago  (Proceedings  of  the  National  Municipal  League, 
for  1903),  many  features  of  Boston's  first  city  government  were  adapted 
from  town  institutions. 

2  A.  F.  Weber,  The  Growth  of  Cities  in  the  Nineteenth  Century  (New 
York,  1899),  20. 


10  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

tricts,  to  each  of  which  constables  were  assigned  for  duty ; 
it  was  not  till  1837,  however,  that  a  regular  system  of  day 
patrols  was  instituted.  A  water-supply  service,  estab- 
lished by  Aaron  Burr  and  his  associates  under  their  famous 
charter,  was  also  in  operation,  and  served  the  city,  though 
not  very  satisfactorily,  till  the  Croton  supply  became  avail- 
able in  1842.  In  most  of  the  larger  towns  public  sewers 
began  to  be  erected  to  supersede  the  drains  owned  by  in- 
dividuals; public  lighting  of  the  streets,  at  first  by  oil 
lamps  but  later  by  gas,  became  common;  and  some  atten- 
tion was  being  paid  to  the  cleaning  of  streets.1  Raised 
footways  or  sidewalks,  usually  of  cobble-stones  but  some- 
times of  boards,  were  built  in  the  main  thoroughfares  of 
the  larger  municipalities.  Fire  protection  was  undertaken 
by  volunteer  companies ;  the  system  of  public  education 
was  formulating  itself  slowly;  and  in  some  places  land 
was  being  set  aside  for  recreation  grounds.  All  in  all,  a 
good  beginning  in  the  provision  of  the  chief  municipal 
services  was  made  during  the  first  quarter  of  the  nineteenth, 
century. 

The  ante-  The  third  period  in  American  municipal  development, 
period.  extending  from  about  1825  to  the  close  of  the  Civil  War, 
witnessed  the  elaboration  of  those  administrative  principles 
which  had  gained  recognition  in  the  preceding  era.  The 
new  charter  of  New  York,  enacted  in  1830,  showed  the 
direction  in  which  the  tide  was  running.2  It  divided  the 
city  council  into  two  chambers,  and  explicitly  stated  that 
this  action  was  taken  in  order  that  the  principles  upon 
which  the  national  government  was  based  might  be  recog- 
nized. By  this  charter  the  mayor  was  invested  with  the 

1  A  system  of  public  sewers  was  established  in  Boston  in  1823  ;  public 
lighting  of  the  streets  had  been  carried  on  long  prior  to  this  date,  but 
lighting  by  gas  was  not  introduced  till  1834.  See  Nathan  Matthews, 
The  City  Government  of  Boston  (Boston,  1895),  59,  97. 

*  J.  A.  Fairlie,  Municipal  Administration,  83. 


AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT  11 

right  to  veto  any  order  or  resolution  of  the  council,  his 
veto  to  be  overridden  only  by  a  two-thirds  vote  of  both 
chambers.  Up  to  this  time  the  public  services  of  the  city 
had,  so  far  as  they  went,  been  managed  by  the  council 
through  its  committees.  The  unsatisfactory  character  of 
this  method  was  evidently  becoming  apparent,  however; 
for  the  new  charter  provided  that  these  services  should 
thenceforth  be  intrusted  to  administrative  officials  ap- 
pointed for  the  purpose  by  the  council.  Notwithstanding 
this  provision,  the  council  committees  continued  for  some 
years  to  exercise  a  large  influence  in  administering  the  city 
departments.  Wherever  charter  revisions  took  place  in 
other  cities  during  the  forties  and  fifties,  the  same  drift  is 
observable.  At  various  points  one  encounters  the  begin- 
nings of  a  movement  which  aimed  to  make  the  mayoralty  Popular 
a  semi-independent  organ  of  city  government,  chosen  directly  mayors. 
by  the  people  and  exercising  on  a  reduced  scale  the  sort  of. 
powers  given  to  the  executive  heads  of  state  and  national 
governments.1 

Another  interesting  development  of  this  period  was  the  Widening  of 

the  suffrage. 

widening  of  the  municipal  suffrage.  Prior  to  1830  many 
of  the  states  imposed  a  property,  or  tax-paying,  qualifica- 
tion for  the  right  to  vote,  whether  in  state  or  in  local  elec- 
tions ; 2  but  during  the  presidency  of  Andrew  Jackson  a 
movement  for  the  abolition  of  these  requirements  obtained 
impetus  in  the  general  atmosphere  of  the  new  democracy, 
and  before  the  middle  of  the  century  universal  suffrage  had^. 
an  f^r  a-g.-f.Ti  P|  white  population  was  concerned,  become  the^ 

1  See,  for  examples,  the  Boston  charter  amendments  of  1854  (Laws 
of  Massachusetts,  1854,  ch.  448),  which  gave  the  mayor  the  veto  power ; 
and  the  Philadelphia  charter  of  1854,  commonly  called  the  Consolidation 
Act  (February  2,  1854),  which  considerably  increased  the  independent 
authority  of  the  mayor.    For  a  discussion  of  this  latter  change,  see  Alli- 
son and  Penrose,  History  of  Philadelphia,  ch.  iv. 

2  The  list  may  be  found  in  Alexis  de  Tocqueville's  Democracy  in  America 
(ed.  D.  C.  Oilman,  2  vols.,  New  York,  1898),  II.  Appendix. 


12  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

accepted  policy  in  virtually  all  the  states.  The  observant 
Tocqueville,  writing  in  the  early  thirties,  foresaw  this 
outcome.  "Where  a  nation,"  he  wrote,  "begins  to  modify 
the  elective  qualification,  it  may  easily  be  foreseen  that, 
sooner  or  later,  the  qualification  will  be  entirely  abol- 
ished. .  .  .  Concession  follows  concession,  and  no  stop  can 
be  made  short  of  universal  suffrage."  Since  the  suffrage 
qualifications  were,  as  a  rule,  alike  in  state  and  city,  the 
extensions  in  one  affected  the  situation  in  the  other.  Man- 
hood suffrage  came  upon  the  cities,  however  r  at  a  rather 
trying  time,  for  close  upon  its  adoption  followed  the  large 
European  immigrations  to  America.  The  foreigners,  of 
whom  the  cities  received  the  larger  share,  were  admitted 
to  voting  rights  as  soon  as  they  were  naturalized,  and  the 
facility  with  which  they  often  lent  themselves  to  exploitation 
by  unscrupulous  politicians  unquestionably  had  an  influence 
in  breaking  down  some  of  the  sound  traditions  which  the 
cities  had  conserved  till  that  time. 
The  spoils  It  was  at  this  stage  in  municipal  development,  moreover. 

system.  ~  "•*•""" 

that  the  soils  sstem  gained  its  firm  anchorage  not  only 


in  the  national  and  state  administrations,  but  in  the  s 
of  selecting  city  officials  as  well.  In  the  larger  cities  ap- 
pointments to  administrative  posts  rested,  for  the  most 
part,  within  the  power  of  the  city  council;  and,  since  the 
members  of  this  body  were  usually  chosen  from  wards,  in 
contests  conducted  along  party  lines,  they  readily  fell  into 
the  habit  of  treating  such  appointments  as  political  patron- 
age. Moreover,  since  the  idea  of  rotation  in  office  as  a 
maxim  of  democracy  made  its  way  from  national  and  state 
politics  into  city  affairs,  even  office-holders  of  the  dominant 
political  party  had  to  give  place  when  their  terms  expired. 
All  incentive  to  the  development  of  skill  and  efficiency  in 
the  conduct  of  municipal  administration  was  thereby 
removed. 


AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT  13 

Another  important  feature  in  the  evolution  of  municipal  Separation 
institutions  during  the  ante-bellum  era  was  the  rise  of  the  trationfrom 
independent  administrative  department.  The  New  York 
charter  of  1830,  as  has  been  seen,  provided  that  the  council 
should  elect  administrative  officers  to  take  charge  of  various 
city  services ;  but  the  fact  that  these  officials  were  ap- 
pointed by  the  council  kept  the  latter  body  in  real  control 
of  their  work  and  prevented  any  marked  improvement. 
In  1849,  however,  a  new  charter  changed  the  situation  by 
prescribing  that  thereafter  the  officers  in  charge  of  city 
departments  should  be  chosen  by  popular  vote.1  This 
gave  them  independence  of  the  municipal  legislature,  and 
was  an  important  step  in  the  direction  of  divorcing  the 
administrative  arm  of  city  government  from  the  legislative. 
New  York,  moreover,  was  not  alone  as  an  exponent  of  this 
policy;  Chicago  and  Cleveland  furnish  like  examples.  In 
the  latter  city  a  board  of  improvements  was  established, 
consisting  of  the  mayor,  the  city  engineer,  and  three  elective 
commissioners;  and  to  this  new  commission  was  given 
the  supervision  of  all  public  works.2  In  Philadelphia,  like- 
wise, the  new  charter  of  1854  made  the  office  of  city  treasurer 
elective;  and  in  establishing  the  new  post  of  city  comp- 
troller it  made  that  elective  also.3 

But  while  some  advantages  came  from  the  experiment  of  Appointive 
giving  the  administrative  departments  a  position  of  inde- 
pendence, it  was  soon  apparent  that  efficient  heads  for 
those  branches  of  the  city  service  could  not  be  secured  by 
popular  election.  In  various  cities,  therefore,  the  selection 
of  these  officials  was  taken  from  the  voters  and  given  to 
the  mayor,  with  the  restriction  that  his  appointments 

1  Laws  of  New  York,  1849,  ch.  147. 

s  Municipal  Organization  Act,  May  3,  1852,  §  41.     See  also  Charles 
Snavely,  History  of  the  City  Government  of  Cleveland  (Baltimore,  1902),  41. 
*  Allison  and  Penrose,  History  of  Philadelphia,  172-175. 


14  GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 

should  be  subject  to  confirmation  by  the  upper  chamber 
of  the  city  council.  New  York  made  this  change  in  1857 ; 1 
Chicago  and  Baltimore  followed  within  a  few  years.  The 
idea  of  making  the  mayor  responsible  for  the  appointment 
of  a  municipal  cabinet  comprising  the  heads  of  the  various 
departments  soon  gained  popularity,  partly  because  it 
seemed  in  consonance  with  the  general  plan  of  American 
government  as  exemplified  in  the  larger  areas  of  state  and 
nation,  and  partly  because  the  people  of  the  cities  were 
beginning  to  look  upon  the  mayor  as  the  pivotal  figure  in 
local  administration.  Indeed,  the  decline  of  popular 
confidence  in  city  councils  and  the  increasing  confidence 
in  the  chief  magistrate  form  the  outstanding  features  of 
this  period. 

stricter  A  tendency  to  tighten  the  reins  of  state  control  over 

vision.8"1  "  city  administration  is  another  development  of  the  same  era, 
particularly  of  the  later  years  of  it.  The  inefficiency,  waste- 
fulness, and  even  dishonesty  with  which  the  various  munic- 
ipal services  had  been  administered  by  council  committees 
and  by  officials  elected  by  popular  vote  became  texts  for 
frequent  protests  on  the  floors  of  state  legislatures.  Par- 
ticularly did  the  almost  universal  maladministration  of 
municipal  police  departments,  and  the  consequent  failure 
of  the  cities  to  enforce  the  laws  of  the  state,  furnish  a  stand- 
ing temptation  to  legislative  intervention.  This  interven- 
tion came  in  several  states  during  the  late  fifties.  In  1857 
the  legislature  of  New  York  established  a  state-appointed 
police  board  for  New  York,  Brooklyn,  and  adjacent  munic- 
ipalities, thereby  displacing  local  control  of  the  depart- 
ment.2 The  legislature  of  Maryland  saddled  a  state  police 

1  Laws  of  New  York,  1857,  ch.  446. 

8  "Dissatisfaction  with  the  inefficiency  of  urban  police  and  a  desire 
to  gain  partisan  advantage  were  the  principal  motives."  — L.  F.  PULD, 
Police  Administration  (New  York,  1910),  26. 


AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT  15 

board  upon  Baltimore  in  1860,  state  control  of  municipal 
police  was  established  in  St.  Louis  in  1861,  and  about  the 
same  time  the  legislature  of  Illinois  put  the  police  of  Chicago 
in  a  similar  strait-jacket.  When  the  war  broke  upon  the 
jjind  in  1861.  the  policy  of  taking  municipal  police  control 
into  sta^9  hand^  was  making  rapid  headway :  but  in  due 
course  the  movement  overreached  itself  and  brought  a  reac- 
tion. The  war  disorganized  local  administration  to  some 
extent,  but  not  to  the  degree  that  might  have  been  ex- 
pected. Occasional  disorders  connected  with  the  forced 
drafting  of  recruits  put  added  strain  upon  the  police  depart- 
ment in  some  cities ;  but  otherwise  the  public  services,  in 
regions  outside  the  theatre  of  conflict,  were  carried  on  about 
as  usual.  Foreign  immigration  almost  ceased,  of  course, 
and  during  the  war  years  the  cities  moved  forward  in  popu- 
lation much  more  slowly  than  before  the  struggle  be- 
gan. The  close  of  hostilities  marked  the  beginning  of  a 
new  era  in  almost  every  department  of  economic  and 
industrial  life. 

In  tracing  the  history  of  American  municipal  development  Municipal 
one  may  say  that  the  fourth  important  epoch  extended  tion  after 
through  the  years  of  national  reconstruction  down  to  about 
the  year  1890.  This  era  began  inauspiciously,  for  the 
administration  of  the  larger  cities  of  the  land  appeared  at 
the  time  incurably  bad.  The  action  of  the  state  authorities 
in  withdrawing  powers  from  local  hands  seemed  to  have 
made  things  worse  rather  than  better.  New  York,  where 
the  arm  of  the  state  had  been  most  active,  was  properly 
pilloried  as  the  most  corruptly  administered  city  in  America, 
and  one  of  the  most  corrupt  in  the  world,  its  government 
being  firmly  in  the  clutches  of  the  notorious  Tweed  Ring, 
a  troop  of  plundering  banditti  who  used  their  civic  authority 
to  turn  public  funds  into  private  fortunes.  There  is  no 
page  in  the  annals  of  American  municipal  history  more 


16  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

sordid  than  this.1  Nor  was  the  situation  in  many  other 
cities  at  this  time  much  better.  While  the  war  lasted 
its  effect  was  chastening,  and  local  public  opinion  was  strong 
enough  to  keep  the  municipal  authorities  from  gross  extrava- 
gance ;  but  with  the  end  of  the  conflict  came  an  extraordi- 
nary economic  revival,  —  industry  and  commerce  expanded, 
the  tide  of  immigration  returned,  and  the  cities,  as  was 
entirely  natural,  felt  the  first  effects  of  the  new  prosperity. 
The  tone  of  local  opinion  became  one  of  pronounced  opti- 
mism, an  atmosphere  in  which  opportunities  for  the  abuse 
of  public  trusts  are  usually  abundant.  Taxes  rose,  debts 
increased,  and  much  of  the  money  that  came  into  the 
municipal  treasuries  was  shamelessly  squandered.  A  com- 
prehensive investigation  of  conditions  in  American  cities 
during  the  later  sixties  would  probably  have  disclosed  a 
state  of  affairs  no  better,  and  much  more  difficult  to  remedy, 
than  those  laid  bare  in  the  boroughs  of  England  by  the  royal 
commission  of  1833. 
The  turn  of  By  1870  the  dangers  of  the  situation  had  become  so  clear 

the  tide.  "    ""   ""        •  ...  .  ' 

that  a  popular  uprising  in  the  interest  of  municipal  reform 
could  not  be  prevented  by  all  the  efforts  of  the  powerful  and 
well-organized  groups  of  professional  politicians  who  con- 
trolled affairs  in  the  larger  cities^  In  New  York  the  Tweed 
Ring  was  overthrown,  and  immediately  thereafter  the  city 
received  a  new  charter  which  contained  many  provisions  de- 
signed to  afford  greater  safeguards  against  the  misuse  of  mu- 
nicipal funds.2  Other  cities,  such  as  Pittsburgh,  Chicago,  and 

1  An  excellent  brief  account  of  the  organization  and  operations  of  the 
Tweed  Ring  may  be  found  in  James  Bryce's  American  Commonwealth 
(2  vols.,  New  York,  1910),  II.  384-396. 

*  One  of  these  was  the  provision  establishing  a  Board  of  Estimate  and 
Apportionment,  made  up  of  the  mayor,  the  comptroller,  the  president 
of  the  board  of  aldermen,  and  the  chief  officer  of  the  department  of  taxes 
and  assessments.  To  this  body  was  given  the  task  of  preparing  the 
annual  budget,  a  function  which  had  up  to  1873  been  exercised  by  a  com- 
mittee of  the  city  council.  The  change  was  designed  to  put  an  end  to 


AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT  17 

St.  Louis,  undertook  important  administrative  reforms 
during  the  next  few  years.  In  general  the  changes  were 
all  in  the  direction  of  concentrating  upon  the  mayor  a  large 
part  of  the  responsibility  for  selecting;  those  administrative, 
officers  who  controlled  the  large  spending  departments. 
In  some  instances  the  mayor  was  authorized  to  suspend  or 
remove  undutiful  heads  of  departments,  and  in  nearly 
every  case  his  veto  power  was  put  upon  a  firm  statutory 
basis. 

Many  of  the  worst  abuses  in  city  government  were  the  Curbing 
legitimate  progeny  of  the  spoils  system.  As  has  already  system*, 
been  seen,  the  iniquitous  doctrine  that  public  office  and 
public  patronage  were  the  fair  rewards  of  partisan  valor 
obtained  its  foothold  in  the  national  service  during  the 
presidency  of  Andrew  Jackson.  Malignant  ills  of  this 
type  seem  to  spread  very  rapidly  in  the  body  politic,  and 
it  was  not  long  before  the  Jacksonian  dogma  had  obtained 
acceptance  in  the  fields  of  state  and  municipal  administra- 
tion. The  period  following  the  war  found  the  spoils  system 
triumphant  in  all  the  larger  cities.  Independent  spirits 
like  Charles  Sumner  had  begun  a  campaign  against  it  in 
the  national  service,1  but  in  the  cities  scarcely  a  voice  was 
yet  heard  in  denunciation.  The  New  York  charter  of  1873. 
however,  dealt  the  system  of  official  patronage  an  indirect 
but  important  blow  when  it  prohibited  the  removal  of 
policemen  and  firemen  except  for  good  cause^  In  fact,  the 
beginnings  of  civil-service  reform  in  the  cities  are  to  be  found 
in  attempts  to  prevent  improper  removals  rather  than  in  enr 
dfta/yflrs  tfn  sftf.iirfi  proper  appointments.  The  merit  system 
of  appointment  was  making  headway  in  the  national  adminis- 
tration during  the  period,  but  it  was  not  till  after  1890 

the  carnival  of  extravagance  which  had  been  made  possible,  and  even 
been  encouraged,  by  the  log-rolling  practices  of  the  years  preceding. 
1  Charles  Sumner,  Works  (16  vols.,  Boston,  1874-1883),  VIII.  452-457. 


18  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

that  it  gained  any  considerable  recognition  in  the  charters 
of  cities.1 

Growth  of         During  the  quarter-century  following  the  war  American 
cities  made  an  unprecedented  advance  in  population,  in 


the  share  which  they  assumed  in  national  life,  and  in  the 
importance  of  the  public  services  undertaken  by  them.  In 
1860  the  number  of  American  municipalities  having  popula- 
tions exceeding  8000  had  increased  to  141  ;  in  1870  it  was 
226;  in  1890  it  was  448.  In  1865  these  cities  contained 
less  than  twenty  per  cent  of  the  entire  national  popula- 
tion; in  1890  the  urban  element  had  risen  to  thirty  per 
cent.  In  the  intervening  quarter-century  the  city  dwellers 
had  trebled  in  total  numerical  strength  ;  nearly  20,000,000 
Americans  in  1890  lived  in  cities  and  towns.  Particularly 
marked,  moreover,  was  the  growth  of  the  larger  cities  in 
this  era.  In  1890  there  were  six  cities  of  the  United  States 
with  populations  exceeding  half  a  million  each,  fifteen  had 
above  200,000,  and  twenty-five  over  100,000.  For  much 
of  this  growth  the  steady  stream  of  immigration,  the  devel- 
opment of  railway  and  marine  transportation,  and  the  general 
expansion  of  industry  were  responsible.  Cities  had  p-own. 
not  only  through  their  own  internal  increase  of  population. 
and  through  the  lar^e  alien  element  which  came  to  them. 
but  also  by  drawing  on  the  rural  districts  and  the  small 
towns. 

inefficiency  With  this  rapid  growth  the  various  municipal  functions 
tried  to  keep  pace,  but  frequently  without  success.  Follow- 
ing the  example  of  New  York,  all  the  cities  of  any  consider- 
able size  had  established  professional  police  systems,  and 


1  The  early  history  of  the  fight  against  the  spoils  system  is  given  by 
C.  R.  Fish,  The  Civil  Service  and  the  Patronage  (New  York,  1905),  es- 
pecially eh.  x.  For  the  theories  upon  which  the  spoils  system  rested, 
see  H.  J.  Ford,  The  Rise  and  Growth  of  American  Politics  (New  York, 
1898),  ch.  xiii. 


AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT  19 

had  for  the  most  part  put  them  in  charge  of  boards  or  of 
single  commissioners.  Some  of  the  states  that  had  assumed 
direct  control  of  local  police  in  their  larger  cities  gave  up 
this  control,  —  New  York,  for  example,  in  1870,  and  Michi- 
gan in  1891.  Other  states  followed  a  contrary  policy.  — 
as  Massachusetts,  which  established  a  state  police  commis- 
sion for  Boston  in  1885,  and  Ohio,  which  took  over  the 
police  administration  of  Cincinnati  in  the  year  following. 
In  the  matter  of  fire  protection,  the  general  establishment 
of  professional  brigades  and  the  enormous  improvement  in 
appliances  were  features  of  the  period.  Water  and  sewerage 
systems  were  extended  and  greatly  improved;  comprehen- 
sive schemes  of  street  lighting  were  adopted  in  even  the 
smaller  cities ;  modern  pavements  came  into  general  use ; 
municipal  transit  facilities  were  bettered,  particularly  with 
the  introduction  of  the  trolley  system;  and  vastly  more 
attention  was  given  to  public  elementary  education,  to  the 
creation  of  parks  and  places  of  public  recreation,  and  to  the 
provision  of  municipal  hospitals. 

All  this  expansion  was  inevitably  accompanied  by  a  rapid  increase  in 

— — — ••_•• *••••••••«••••••••—••• — • •        -••••••••*•••••••••••*•••.  \  ,      im   municipal 

increase  in  annual  municipal  expenditures  and  by  an  even  borrowing. 
more  marked  increase  in  city  debts.  The  latter  mounted 
everywhere,  often  to  such  dangerous  proportions  that  in 
several  states  attempts  were  made  to  hold  municipal  in- 
debtedness within  bounds  by  the  application  of  statutory 
debt  limits,  and  by  other  hampers  upon  the  freedom  to  bor- 
row on  the  city's  credit.  Much  of  that  heavy  burden  which 
to-day  puts  some  larger  cities  in  rather  straitened  circum- 
stances by  reason  of  the  vast  amounts  that  must  annually 
go  to  pay  interest  on  bonded  debt,  is  directly  traceable  to 
the  lavish  and  often  ill-advised  exercise  of  municipal  bor- 
rowing powers  which  characterized  the  policy  of  the  city 
authorities  during  the  seventies  and  eighties.  Loans  for 
public  works  and  services  were  contracted  under  arrange- 


20  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

ments  that  inadequately  provided  for  repayment,  or  that 
spread  repayment  over  long  periods.  The  lifetime  of  bonds 
often  proved  more  extended  than  the  duration  of  the  works 
or  services  for  which  the  borrowed  funds  had  been  ex- 
pended. Not  a  little  of  the  trouble  arose  from  slovenly 
financial  methods,  from  the  wholly  ineffective  system  of 
municipal  accounting,  and  from  the  indefensible  policy, 
which  most  cities  pursued,  of  paying  for  present-day  needs 
by  obligating  a  future  generation. 

An  era  of  With  all  its  persisting  problems  and  its  apparent  inabil- 
provement.  ity  to  find  solution  for  most  of  them,  the  American  munici- 
pal system  underwent  noticeable  improvement  during  the 
quarter-century  preceding  1890.  Some  of  the  more  flagrant 
abuses  were  greatly  diminished,  some  of  the  lesser  ills 
disappeared.  From  time  to  time  during  the  period  there 
were  spasms  of  civic  virtue.  Public  indignation  in  this  or 
that  large  city  would  arise,  shake  off  its  wonted  apathy,  and 
turn  a  remiss  administration  out  of  office;  then  it  would 
usually  allow  itself  to  be  lulled  into  false  security  while 
the  old  regime  gradually  worked  itself  back  into  full  opera- 
tion. Reform  movements  labored  under  heavy  handicaps, 
for  the  public  temper  would  hardly  be  ready  to  brook  any 
root-and-branch  demolition  of  existing  municipal  institu- 
tions. Proposals  for  improvement  had,  accordingly,  to 
reckon  with  a  rigid  popular  loyalty  to  the  principle  of 
division  of  powers  in  city  government,  and  such  of  them  as 
secured  adoption  were  invariably  inadequate  to  the  desired 
ends.  The  cause  of  municipal  reform  suffered  greatly 
in  the  public  estimation  through  its  frequent  championship 
of  halfway  measures,  which  were  put  through  with  great 
expenditure  of  energy  but  which  accomplished  very  little 
after  their  acceptance.  To  gain  support  for  their  proposals^ 
reformers  had  to  promise  more  civic  improvement  than 
their  measures  could  ever  achieve ;  and  this  r.nn^t.ant  dis- 


AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT.  21 

crepancy  between  prediction  and  performance  brought  a 
natural  loss  in  publfc  prestige.1 

i  The  latest  period  in  the  growth  of  the  American  municipal  The  last  two 
system,  extending  from  about  1890  to  the  present  time,  has 
been  in  many  ways  the  most  important  and  the  most  inter- 
esting of  all.  It  began  with  somewhat  indistinct  gleams 
of  an  awakening  civic  conscience.  During  the  nineties,. 
however,  the  old  municipal  framework  suffered  little  impair- 
ment ;  for  the  assaults  of  reform  were  directed  against 
particular  features  of  it  rather  than  against  its  general  prin- 
ciples of  construction.2  The  spoils  system,  for  example, 
became  a  favorite  target,  and  with  excellent  results.  Soon 
after  civil-service  reform  had  proved  its  profitableness  in 
national  administration,  the  agitation  for  its  extension  to 
state  and  municipal  appointments  brought  tangible  results 
in  New  York  and  Massachusetts,  the  former  state  enacting 
its  first  civil-service  law  in  1883,  and  the  latter  in  1884. 
After  an  interval  of  about  a  decade  three  other  states, 
Illinois,  Wisconsin,  and  Indiana,  followed  in  1895.  Louisi- 
ana gave  the  merit  system  a  limited  recognition  in  1896, 
Connecticut  in  1897;  and  one  by  one  most  of  the  other 
states  have  been  added  to  the  list,  until  at  the  present 
time  about  two-thirds  of  them  have  civil-service  reform 
laws  of  one  sort  or  another.3  In  many  cases  the  cities  have 

1  See  below,  pp.  377-383. 

2  In  1899,  for  example,  the  National  Municipal  League  undertook  to 
frame  a  model  organic  law  for  American  cities  of  medium  size;  and  this 
draft,  which  was  given  to  the  public  under  the  title  of  A  Municipal  Pro- 
gram, did  not  venture  to  depart  in  any  essential  way  from  the  orthodox 
type  of  American  city  government.     It  pronounced  in  favor  of  a  one- 
chambered  council,  and  suggested  many  useful  improvements  in  municipal 
machinery ;    but  its  framers  evinced  no  readiness  to  throw  overboard 
the  old  principle  of  separation  of  powers.     Hence  the  Municipal  Pro- 
gram retained  provision  for  an  independent  mayor,  and  proposed  that 
this  officer  should  have  the  usual  power  of  veto. 

8  C.  R.  Fish,  The  Civil  Service  and  the  Patronage,  ch.  xi. ;  also  the  annual 
report  of  the  National  Civil  Service  Reform  League  for  1910. 


22  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

secured  legislation  putting  certain  of  their  officials  and  em- 
ployees under  civil-service  rules  even  before  the  policy  has 
gained  acceptance  in  the  state  administration.  There  are 
now  very  few  municipalities  of  any  considerable  size  in 
which  civil-service  reform  has  not  gained  some  footing. 
It  would  be  difficult  to  overestimate  the  beneficent  political 
reaction  which  the  introduction  of  the  merit  system,  even 
upon  a  narrow  scale,  has  exercised  in  American  cities.  Not 
all  municipal  abuses  can  be  related  to  the  vice  of  political 
patronage;  but  a  great  many  of  them  are  very  closely 
connected  with  it,  and  it  is  certain  that  where  patronage 
has  been  eliminated,  or  even  restricted,  some  of  the  worst 
evils  have  disappeared. 

Other  improvements  in  municipal  methods  during  the 
nineties  deserve  mention.  One  was  a  return  to  the  early 
practice  of  holding  state  and  city  elections  upon  different 
dates,  a  procedure  which  made  possible  the  divorce  of 
local  from  state  issues.  This  method  was  not  followed 
by  all  the  larger  cities,  however;  for  it  always  has  to 
brave  the  opposition  of  party  organizations,  and  its  adop- 
tion necessarily  involves  considerable  extra  expense.  The 
abolition  of  the  two-chambered  council,  the  reduction 
in  size  of  the  municipal  legislature,  the  substitution  of 
election  at  large  for  election  by  wards,  the  abolition 
of  aldermanic  checks  upon  the  mayor's  appointing  power, 
—  all  these  features  gained  favor  in  some  cities  prior 
to  1900. 
The  civic  But  the  real  renaissance  in  American  city  government 

renaissance. 

has  come  during  the  last  ten  or  twelve  years,  and  may  be 
said  to  have  begun  with  the  Galveston  experiment  of  1901r 
although  somewhat  connected  with  the  general  movement 
for  the  concentration  of  power  in  the  mayor.  The  genesis 
of  government  by  commission  and  its  remarkable  growth  in 
popularity  throughout  the  United  States  are  matters  that 


AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT  23 

will  be  discussed  in  a  later  chapter.1  It  ought  to  be  empha- 
sized at  this  point,  however,  that  the  advocates  of  the  com- 
mission plan  were  the  first  pproup  of  municipal  reformers  to 
bring  forth  a  proposal  to  abolish  the  traditional  separation 
of  legislative  and  administrative  powers,  and  consequently 
the  first  to  urp;e  a  complete  reorganization,  on  a  simplified 
basis,  of  the  whole  municipal  framework.  The  plan  has 
spread  rapidly ;  its  acceptance  by  one  or  more  cities  in  more 
than  two-thirds  of  the  states  constitutes  the  most  striking 
phenomenon  of  the  latest  decade  in  American  municipal 
development.  With  the  adoption  of  commission  charters, 
moreover,  most  cities  have  used  the  opportunity  to  make 
other  organic  changes.  The  introduction  of  provisions  for^ 
direct  legislation  and  the  recall  has,  for  example,  been  a 
feature  of  charter  revisions  almost  everywhere.2  The  open, 
direct  ninizi^rtisan_jiQniary  as  a  means  of  putting  candi- 
dates in  nomination  for  municipal  offices  has  also  found  its 
way  into  many  of  the  newer  charters.  As  yet,  Boston  alone 
has  preferred  the  system  of  nomination  by  petition.  Some 
other  cities  have  obviated  the  necessity  for  any  serious  nomi- 
nating formality  by  adopting  the  plan  of  preferential  voting. 
But  all  these  various  changes  in  nomination  methods  have 
had  the  same  motive  behind  them, — namely,  to  break  down 
the  power  of  the  party  leaders,  and  to  give  a  fair  opportu- 
nity to  those  candidates  for  municipal  office  who  might 
come  forward  without  the  pledged  support  of  any  political 
organization.  The  abolition  of  party  designations  on  the 
municipal  ballot,  the  simplification  and  shortening  of  the 
ballot  itself  by  a  reduction  in  the  number  of  elective  officers, 
the  provision  of  new  securities  for  fairness  at  elections,  — 
all  these  reforms  have  made  unparalleled  headway  during 
the  last  ten  years. 

Improvements  in  internal  administration  have  gone  hand 
1  Below,  oh.  xii.  2  See  below,  ch.  xiii. 


24 


GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Administra-  in  hand  with  these  organic  changes. 

tive  reforms, 


Better  methods  of 


Improve- 
ments in 
municipal 
services. 


municipal  accounting;  and  auditing,  a  closer  scrutiny  of  all 
payments  out  of  the  municipal  treasury,  the  elimination 
of  such  vicious  features  as  padded  payrolls,  non-competitive 
contracts,  and  patronage  purchases,  the  proper  safeguarding 
of  the  city's  interests  in  all  dealings  with  public-service 
corporations,  —  these  are  a  few  examples  of  the  progress 
toward  greater  efficiency  and  economy  made  by  many  of 
the  cities  of  the  United  States  within  recent  years. 

Noteworthy  improvements  in  both  the  scope  and  the 
efficiency  of  various  municipal  services  have  been  made 
in  the  last  two  decades.  In  1890  there  was  little  or  no 
public  interest  in  city  planning,  or,  indeed,  in  any  of  these 
later-day  movements  which  have  for  their  aim  the  aesthetic 
improvement  of  cities.  Municipal  works  were  undertaken 
with  little  regard  to  what  had  gone  before,  and  with  less 
regard  to  what  was  likely  to  come  after.  All  this  has 
changed,  or  is  changing.  So,  too,  there  has  been  a  great 
advance  along  the  lines  of  municipal  sanitation  and  care  for, 
the  public  health ;  arrangements  for  the  protection  of  life 
and  property  have  been  better  organized ;  and  lighting  and 
transportation  systems  have  made  more  progress  in  efficiency 
during  the  last  twenty  years  than  they  did  in  the  preceding 
fifty.1  Finally,  the  civic  conscience  has  been  brought  from 
apathy  to  activity,  and  the  whole  tone  and  temper  of  mu- 
nicipal life  has  been  raised  thereby.  Public  opinion  in 
American  cities  is  healthier  to-day  than  it  has  been  for 
three-quarters  of  a  century;  it  will  not  tolerate  doings 
which  it  freely  condoned  a  generation  ago.  In  the  late 
eighties  and  early  nineties  it  was  in  many  large  cities  practi- 
cally impossible  to  secure  a  fair  election.  Impersonation, 
repeating,  intimidation,  and  kindred  offences  against  the 


1  For  further  details,  see  Charles  Zueblin,  American  Municipal  Prog- 
ress (New  York,  1903),  and  Decade  of  Civic  Development  (Chicago,  1905). 


AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT  25 

election  laws  were  committed  with  impunity,  in  some  cases 
with  the  aid  or  the  connivance  of  the  police  officials  of  the        . 
municipality.     All   that   has   passed    away,    or   nearly   so. 
Organized  crookedness  in  politics,  as  in  business,  has  become         * 
unprofitable. 

Much  of  the  credit  for  this  improved  tone  in  city  affairs  The  organs 
is  due  to  the  host  of  local  organizations  whose  officers  and 
members  have  labored  unceasingly  to  leaven  the  whole 
electoral  lump.  The  cause  of  municipal  reform,  like  all 
reform  causes,  has  produced  its  due  quota  of  misguided 
zealots  who  would  fain  reap  where  they  have  not  sown, 
and  who,  accordingly,  have  aimed  to  hurry  the  cities  into 
righteousness  without  that  preliminary  education  of  the 
electorate  which  is  the  only  safe  foundation  upon  which  to 
build.  Yet,  on  the  whole,  the  great  majority  of  civic  organi- 
zations, as  a  subsequent  chapter  is  designed  to  show,  have 
done  their  work  patiently  and  to  good  ultimate  end.  Dur- 
ing the  last  decade,  moreover,  there  has  been  more  team  play 
among  the  organizations,  and  a  greater  readiness  to  coordi- 
nate their  various  activities  so  that  energy  may  not  be  wasted. 

Jn  point  of  city  growth  the  last  twenty  years  constitute.  City  growth 
the  most  remarkable  period  in  American  history.     In  1890  twenty  s 
the  urban  population  of  the  United  States  formed  36.1  per  y 
cent  of  the  whole ;  in  1900  it  had  risen  to  40.5  per  cent,  and 
in  1910  it  rose  to  46.3  per  cent,  a  total  increase  of  10  per  cent 
in  two  decades.     That  is  a  greater  gain  than  has  marked 
any  previous  period  of  equal  length.     In  1890  there  were 
15  cities  with  populations  exceeding  200,000 ;   in  1910  there 
were  28.     In   1890  there  were  28   cities  with  more  than 
100,000,  and  56  with  over  50,000;   in  1910  these   numbers 
had  risen  to  50  and  98  respectively.     Even  more  striking  is 
the  rate  at  which  some  individual  cities  have  been  expanding. 
During  the  decade  1900-1910  more  than  twenty  American 
cities  showed  increases  of  population  ranging  from  100  per 


26  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

cent  to  nearly  250  per  cent  or  more.  The  growth  of  Birming- 
ham, Alabama,  for  example,  gave  that  city  the  phenomenal 
record  of  245  per  cent ;  but  the  fact  that  Los  Angeles  gained 
211  per  cent,  Seattle  194  per  cent,  Spokane  183  per  cent, 
Dallas  116  per  cent,  and  Schenectady  129  per  cent  shows 
that  the  phenomenon  was  not  peculiar  to  any  section  of  the 
country. 

f  ^th**8  ^  *kis  seems  to  prove  that  the  great  urbanizing  forces 
future.  which  made  the  nineteenth  century  the  classic  era  of 
city  expansion  are  still  at  work  with  undiminished  vigor. 
The  continued  development  of  production  on  a  large  scale, 
the  centripetal  influence  of  artificial  power,  the  greater  facili- 
ties which  the  large  city  gives  to  industry  in  the  matter  of 
transportation,  the  better  opportunities  that  it  offers  for 
the  profitable  utilization  of  by-products,  the  elasticity  of 
the  labor  market  in  urban  centres,  the  advantages  derivable 
from  a  considerable  market  close  at  hand,  —  all  this  has 
tended  to  concentrate  the  great  industrial  assets  of  the 
United  States  in  the  cities,  and  particularly  in  the  larger 
cities.  Time  was  when  industries  went  where  the  water- 
power  happened  to  be  placed  by  nature;  but  nowadays 
great  industries  are  rarely,  if  ever,  ready  to  sacrifice  for 
the  sake  of  this  single  feature  the  other  great  advantages 
afforded  by  an  urban  location.  It  is  the  combination  erf 
cheap  fuel  for  motive  power,  cheap  labor  r  and  cheap  trans- 
portation which  now  determines  the  location  and  governs 
the  growth  of  great  cities.  The  development  of  water- 
borne  commerce  has  also  had  its  great  share  —  greater  than 
most  people  realize  —  in  the  making  of  large  American 
cities.  The  fact  that,  of  the  thirty  cities  which  the  census 
of  1910  reported  as  having  populations  exceeding  150,000, 
all  but  four  are  located  upon  navigable  water  is  not  a  mere 
coincidence ;  it  is  a  tangible  proof  (which  may  be  corrobo- 
rated by  a  glance  at  the  maps  of  other  countries)  of  the 


AMERICAN  MUNICIPAL  DEVELOPMENT  27 

intimate  relation  that  exists  between  the  statistics  of  mari- 
time commerce  and  the  census  figures  of  city  growth.1 

These  primary  causes  of  urban  expansion  have  made  their  The  forces 

still  at  work. 

way  into  the  twentieth  century  with  unabated  vigor.  They 
show  no  signs  of  weakening.  Despite  predictions  that  the 
"law  of  diminishing  returns  in  agriculture,"  the  "centrifugal 
influence  of  electric  power  in  industry,"  and  "the  abolition 
of  discriminations  in  transportation  rates  by  state  and  federal 
commerce  commissions"  would  all  operate  to  stem  the 
drift  to  the  large  centres,  there  is  no  sign  that  any  or  all  of 
these  factors  have  had  any  effective  counteracting  influence. 
So  also  the  secondary  causes  of  urban  growth  —  the  social, 
political,  educational,  and  other  advantages  of  city  life  — 
have  increased  rather  than  diminished  in  strength.  The 
cumulative  influences  that  go  to  constitute  the  magnetism 
of  the  modern  city  were  never  more  pronounced  than  they 
are  to-day.  Their  seemingly  irresistible  strength  warrants.. 
the  expectation  that,  before  many  years 


urban  population  of  the  United   States  will  have  gainecL 
numerical  mastery*. 

REFERENCES 

There  is  no  general  history  of  municipal  development  in  the  United 
States,  although  one  is  much  to  be  desired.  Several  useful  monographs  in 
the  Johns  Hopkins  University  Studies  in  Historical  and  Political  Science, 
however,  deal  with  the  development  of  municipal  institutions  in  various 
sections  of  the  country.  Among  these  may  be  mentioned  Dr.  Albert  Shaw's 
Local  Government  in  Illinois  (1883)  ;  E.  R.  L.  Gould's  Local  Government 
in  Pennsylvania  (1883),  and  W.  P.  Holcomb's  Pennsylvania  Boroughs 
(1886)  ;  E.  W.  Bemis's  Local  Government  in  the  South  and  Southwest 
(1893)  ;  and  D.  E.  Spencer's  Local  Government  in  Wisconsin  (1890). 
Professor  Edward  Channing's  Town  and  County  Government  in  the  English 
Colonies  of  North  America  is  an  exceedingly  serviceable  study  of  local 
institutions  during  the  colonial  period. 

1  For  an  interesting  discussion  concerning  the  various  causes  of  urban 
concentration  and  the  probabilities  of  a  continued  rural  exodus,  see 
A.  F.  Weber,  The  Growth  of  Cities  in  the  Nineteenth  Century  (New  York, 
1899),  ch.  iii. 


28  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

Much  has  also  been  written  on  the  municipal  history  of  each  of  the 
larger  cities.  Among  the  most  useful  books  in  this  field  are  the  following : 
J.  G.  Wilson,  Memorial  History  of  the  City  of  New  York  (4  vols.,  New 
York,  1892-1893) ;  Theodore  Roosevelt,  New  York  (New  York,  1891) ; 
A.  T.  Andreas,  History  of  Chicago  (3  vols.,  Chicago,  1885) ;  S.  E.  Sparling, 
Municipal  History  and  Present  Organization  of  the  City  of  Chicago  (Madi- 
son, 1898)  ;  H.  S.  Grosser,  Chicago:  a  Review  of  its  Governmental  History 
(Chicago,  1906) ;  E.  P.  Allison  and  Boies  Penrose,  History  of  Philadelphia 
(Baltimore,  1887) ;  J.  T.  Scharf,  History  of  St.  Louis  (2  vols.,  Philadelphia, 
1883) ;  Josiah  Quincy,  Municipal  History  of  Boston  (Boston,  1852) ; 
H.  H.  Sprague,  The  City  Government  of  Boston,  its  Rise  and  Development 
(Boston,  1890) ;  Nathan  Matthews,  City  Government  of  Boston  (Boston, 
1895) ;  St.  George  L.  Sioussat,  Baltimore  (Baltimore,  1900) ;  J.  H.  Hol- 
lander, Financial  History  of  Baltimore  (Baltimore,  1899) ;  Bernard  Moses, 
The  Establishment  of  City  Government  in  San  Francisco  (Baltimore, 
1889) ;  Charles  Snavely,  History  of  the  City  Government  of  Cleveland 
(Baltimore,  1902) ;  W.  W.  Howe,  The  City  Government  of  New  Orleans 
(Baltimore,  1889). 

The  best  short  outline  of  municipal  growth  in  America  is  contained  in 
the  chapter  on  "Municipal  Development  in  the  United  States,"  in  Pro- 
fessor John  A.  Fairlie's  Municipal  Administration  (New  York,  1901).  In 
the  same  author's  Essays  in  Municipal  Administration  (New  York,  1908) 
there  is  also  an  excellent  study  of  "Municipal  Corporations  in  the  Colo- 
nies." Mention  may  also  be  made  of  the  essay  on  "Municipal  Corpora- 
tions, 1701-1901,"  by  Professor  H.  W.  Rogers,  in  the  Yale  Bicentennial 
volume  entitled  Two  Centuries'  Growth  of  American  Law  (New  York, 
1901). 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  SOCIAL  STRUCTURE   OF  THE   CITY 

THE  modern  city  is  roughly  definable  as  a  body  of  popu-  The  city  as 
lation  massed  in  a  small  area.  But  it  is  something  more 
than  that ;  it  is  a  body  of  population  of  other  than  ordinary 
social  texture,  presenting  measurable  characteristics  that 
differentiate  it  from  the  general  mass  of  a  country's  inhabit- 
ants. In  other  words,  if  we  take  as  one  unit  the  100,000 
individuals  who  may  constitute  the  population  of  a  present- 
day  American  city,  and  compare  this  with  another  unit 
made  up  of  100,000  individuals  drawn  at  random  from  the 
length  and  breadth  of  the  land,  from  city  and  country  alike, 
the  two  units  will  show  differences,  more  or  less  marked, 
at  all  points  at  which  their  respective  social  characteristics 
can  be  statistically  compared.  In  such  matters  as  the 
numerical  proportion  of  the  sexes,  the  distribution  of  popu- 
lation according  to  age,  the  variety  and  nature  of  occupa- 
tion, the  birth,  marriage,  and  death  rates,  the  average 
earning  power  of  individuals,  the  proportion  of  the  proper- 
tied to  the  non-propertied  class,  the  relative  prevalence  of 
illiteracy,  pauperism,  and  crime,  a  comparison  of  the  two 
units  will  reveal  differences  which,  in  their  totality,  warrant 
the  conclusion  that  the  modern  city  has  a  sociological 
anatomy  of  its  own. 

In  the  United  States,  as  in  all  other  new  countries,  the  Distribution 
males  outnumber  the  females  in  the  national  population    ys 
as  a  whole;   but  in  the  cities  this  relation  is  reversed,  the 
excess  of  females  being  there  pronounced.1     This  reversal 

According  to  the  twelfth  census,  there  were  1,638,321  more  males 
than  females  in  the  national  population,  —  that  is,  about  two  more  in  every 

29 


30  GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 

of  the  ratio  in  the  urban  sections  of  the  country  is  readily 
explained  by  the  fact  that  the  normal  proportion  of  the 
sexes  in  different  areas  is  dependent  upon  the  prevailing 
occupations  of  the  people.1  In  agricultural  and  mining 
districts  males  predominate  strongly;  in  industrial  centres 
the  reverse  is  true.  The  city  is  such  a  centre;  and  upon 
the  nature  of  its  industries  depends,  of  course,  the  strength 
of  the  female  excess.  In  the  factory  cities  of  New  Eng- 
land, such  as  Lowell,  Manchester,  Holyoke,  and  New 
Bedford,  which  are  strongholds  of  the  textile  industry,  the 
predominance  of  females  ranges  from  three  to  four  per 
hundred  of  population.2  Of  itself,  this  difference  in  the 
ratio  of  the  sexes  between  the  national  population  and  that 
part  of  it  which  is  urban  may  be  regarded  as  a  matter  of 
no  considerable  importance;  but  with  the  steady  influx  of 
women  into  new  industrial  fields  the  difference  may,  and 
probably  will,  become  still  more  marked  as  time  goes  on.3 
Distribution  A  national  population,  not  affected  in  its  growth  by  im- 
byage.  migration  or  emigration,  and  regarded  from  the  viewpoint 
of  its  distribution  by  age,  is  commonly  plotted  on  the 
census  charts  in  the  form  of  an  irregular  pyramid.  At  the 
base  are  the  infants,  at  the  apex  the  aged.  The  base  is 

one  hundred  persons ;  but  in  New  York  City  the  females  constituted 
50.38  per  cent  of  the  population,  in  Philadelphia  50.96  per  cent,  in  Boston 
50.98  per  cent,  in  Detroit  51.26  per  cent,  in  Cincinnati  51.78  per  cent, 
in  New  Orleans  52.26  per  cent,  and  in  Atlanta  53.61  per  cent.  See  Bureau 
of  the  Census,  Bulletin,  No.  14,  "  The  Proportion  of  the  Sexes  in  the  United 
States"  (Washington,  1904).  Figures  based  on  the  thirteenth  census 
(1910)  are  not  yet  available. 

1  Ibid.  For  a  more  elaborate  discussion,  see  Jean  Guillou's  U Emigra- 
tion des  campagnes  vers  les  villes  (Paris,  1905),  143-295. 

8  Some  interesting  statistics  on  this  point  are  given  in  F.  J.  Goodnow's 
Municipal  Government  (New  York,  1909),  28-31. 

1  Of  the  thirty-six  American  cities  which  in  1890  had  populations 
exceeding  50,000,  twenty-four  had  an  excess  of  females ;  but  in  1900  the 
females  outnumbered  the  males  in  twenty-seven  of  these  same  thirty-six 
cities.  The  three  cities  which  changed  columns  during  the  decade  were 
Buffalo,  Los  Angeles,  and  Toledo. 


THE   SOCIAL  STRUCTURE   OF  THE   CITY 


31 


broad,  and  the  more  rapid  the  increase  of  population  the 
broader  this  base  becomes.  The  sides  of  the  pyramid  con- 
verge sharply  for  a  short  distance  above  the  base,  because 
the  mortality  of  infant  years  is  heavy;  the  convergence 
which  portrays  the  more  moderate  mortality  rates  of  youth 
and  middle  life  is  more  gradual ;  and  finally  the  lines  close 
rapidly  in  the  years  above  threescore  and  ten.  Such  a 
population  is  normally  strongest  in  persons  of  immature 
age,  and  weakens  in  each  succeeding  decennial  age  period ; 
but  in  the  United  States  the  foreign  influx  introduces  a 
new  element,  with  the  result  that  the  national  population, 
taken  as  a  whole,  shows  its  chief  strength  in  the  early 
middle-age  periods.1  In  tables  of  urban  residents  this 

1  The  subjoined  chart,  reproduced  from  Paul  Meuriot's  Des  agglomera- 
tions urbaines  dans  I' Europe  contemporaine  (Paris,  1897),  shows  the  dis- 
tribution by  age,  per  10,000  persons,  of  the  populations  of  France  and 
Paris  respectively :  — 


AGES 


,  PARIS 


FRANCE 


90  to  99 

80  to  89 

70  to  79 

60  to  69 

50  to  59 

40  to  49 

30  to  39 

20  to  29 

10  to  19 

0  to    9 


INHABITANTS 


1200      900       600       300         0         300       600       900      1200 


32  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

feature  is  even  more  pronounced.  The  city  population 
is  replenished  in  the  periods  of  youth  and  early  middle 
age  not  only  by  immigration  from  abroad,  but  by  the 
influx  from  the  rural  districts.  The  age  pyramid  bulges, 
therefore,  at  the  points  represented  by  these  periods  in 
life.  In  other  words,  the  city  acquires,  mainly  at  the 
expense  of  the  rural  areas,  an  undue  strength  in  persons 
of  productive  age,  a  fact  which  forms  one  of  the  chief 
contributory  causes  of  its  great  economic  capacity  per  head 
of  population. 

The  rural  American  cities,  particularly  the  larger  ones,  have  pos- 
sessed this  magnetism  in  marked  degree.  They  have  drawn 
far  more  than  their  share  of  young  aliens,  and  at  the  same 
time  have  laid  heavy  toll  upon  the  country  districts  of  the 
land.1  The  call  of  the  city  is  heard  most  plainly  by  the 
able-bodied  young  man  or  woman;  infants  and  persons  of 
advanced  years  do  not  ordinarily  come  to  the  populous 
community  save  as  dependents  upon  individuals  of  the 
productive  age.  The  drain  which  the  city  makes  upon 
the  rural  areas  cannot,  then,  be  measured  merely  by  count- 
ing heads.  Those  who  seek  the  city's  opportunities,  its 
fellowship,  its  comforts,  and  its  human  interest  are  the 
best  blood  of  the  land,  the  vigorous,  the  ambitious,  and  the 
firm-willed  of  both  sexes;  it  is  the  crippled,  the  dull,  and 
the  shiftless  who  commonly  remain  behind.2  Urban  popula- 

1  During  the  decade  1890-1900  about  75  per  cent  of  the  aliens  who 
came  to  the  United  States  were  between  the  ages  of  15  and  40  years. 
As  will  be  pointed  out  a  little  later,  most  of  these  went  to  the  cities.  In 
regard  to  the  age  distribution  of  those  who  came  to  the  cities  from  the 
rural  districts  we  have  no  statistical  data,  but  there  is  no  good  reason 
to  suppose  that  they  were  not  of  about  the  same  ages.  A  full  discussion 
of  the  matter  maybe  found  in  the  census  Bulletin,  No.  13,  "A  Discussion 
of  Age  Statistics"  (Washington,  1904).  The  census  of  1900  showed  that 
of  the  whole  national  population  49  per  cent  were  between  the  ages  of  15 
and  45,  but  that  of  the  population  of  the  cities  of  over  25,000  about  54 
per  cent  were  between  those  ages. 

*  C.  M.  Robinson,  The  Call  of  the  City  (New  York,  1908). 


THE   SOCIAL  STRUCTURE  OP  THE   CITY  33 

tion  ought,  therefore,  as  it  does,  to  make  a  superior  showing 
in  wealth  and  income  per  head.  It  ought  to  display  quali- 
ties of  initiative ;  and  its  achievements  per  individual  should 
in  general  be  greater  than  those  of  rural  areas,  for  it  contains 
more  persons  of  achieving  age. 

The  United  States  is  commonly  regarded  as  the  land  par  Distribution 
excellence  of  alien  accumulation,  and  in  truth  the  resort  to  nationality, 
these  shores  during  the  last  four  decades  has  presented  a 
phenomenon  unparalleled  in  human  history.  Yet  the 
census  of  1900  showed  that  of  the  whole  national  popula- 
tion less  than  14  per  cent  was  foreign-born.  To  the 
country  as  a  whole,  therefore,  the  alien  influx  has  not 
presented  any  unsolvable  problem  of  social  assimilation; 
but  if  one  regards  only  the  cities,  and  particularly  the 
larger  cities,  one  finds  the  situation  tos  be  very  different. 
In  the  cities  of  over  25,000  the  foreign-born  constituted, 
in  1900,  about  26  per  cent  of  the  population;  in  those 
of  over  100,000  the  ratio  was  about  35  per  cent,  and  in 
some  of  the  largest  cities  it  ran  above  50  per  cent.  The 
figures  for  1910  are  certain  to  put  these  urban  percentages 
even  higher. 

The  reasons  for  the  strength  of  the  foreign-born  element  Reasons  for 
in  the  larger  cities  are  easy  enough  to  find.     It  is  not,  as  foreign-bom 
might  be  superficially  supposed,  that  large  cities  are  usually  citiea. 
ports  of  entry  for  European  immigrants,  and  that  the  im- 
migrant settles  down  at  his  first  point  of  arrival ;    for  this 
would  not  explain  the  presence  of  great  alien  elements  in 
cities  like  Chicago,   Cincinnati,  and  St.  Louis.     The  real 
reasons    are   numerous,    and    they    are    chiefly    economic. 
Immigrants  of  some  nationalities  do  go,  and  go  in  large 
numbers,  to  the  rural  districts;   whole  agricultural  regions 
of  the  West,  for  example,  are  peopled  by  Scandinavians. 
The  greater  part  of  the  alien  influx  has,  however,  during 
the  last  few  decades  at  any  rate,  come  from  the  countries 


34 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Relation  of 
the  alien 
influx  to 
municipal 
problems. 


of  Eastern,  Middle,  and  Southern  Europe.  These  races, 
Slavs,  Poles,  Lithuanians,  Italians,  Greeks,  and  Armenians, 
go  very  largely  to  the  urban  centres,  mainly  because  they 
come  here  with  neither  the  capital  nor  the  skill  necessary 
to  enable  them  to  do  anything  else.  Although  many  of  them 
come  from  the  agricultural  regions  of  their  own  lands,  few 
bring  any  knowledge  of  farming  that  would  be  of  much 
service  to  them  here.  It  takes  a  little  knowledge  to  be 
even  an  agricultural  laborer;  and  for  an  immigrant  to 
become  a  farmer  in  America  on  his  own  account  requires 
some  capital  as  well  as  some  knowledge,  whereas  to  obtain 
a  place  as  a  sewer-digger  or  as  a  rough  laborer  in  one  of  the 
various  urban  establishments  requires  neither.  Most  im- 
migrants come  to  America  to  find  work;  and  they  go, 
accordingly,  where  the  work  which  they  can  do  is  to  be 
found.  So  long  as  industry  concentrates  itself  in  the  large 
cities,  and  so  long  as  great  industries  present  a  steady 
demand  for  cheap,  unskilled  labor,  both  of  men  and  of 
women,  the  large  cities  will  naturally  get  most  of  those 
aliens  who  come  without  either  skill  or  sustenance.  About 
the  only  great  industry  employing  large  quantities  of  un- 
skilled labor  and  situated  outside  the  larger  cities  is  that  of 
mining.  This  industry  does  draw  great  numbers  of  newly 
arrived  aliens  into  its  vortex.  It  is  chiefly  for  this  reason 
that  Pennsylvania  usually  ranks  next  to  New  York  in  the 
statistics  of  immigrant  destinations. 

Social  as  well  as  economic  motives  of  course  have  their 
influence.  Aliens  who  speak  only  their  own  language  like 
to  be  among  their  own  people  in  a  strange  land;  more- 
over, then*  passage  to  America  is  very  often  paid  for 
by  friends  or  relatives  already  here.  When  a  colony  of 
any  nationality  is  once  started,  therefore,  the  social  motive 
comes  quickly  into  play.  All  these  things  have,  however, 
been  so  fully  elaborated  by  writers  upon  the  ethnic  fac- 


THE   SOCIAL  STRUCTURE   OF  THE   CITY  35 

tors  in  city  government  that  they  need  no  further  discus- 
sion here.1  / 

The  problem  of  governing  the  state  and  the  nation  re- 
mains primarily  a  problem  of  governing  native  Americans ; 
but  the  task  of  administering  the  affairs  of  the  larger  cities 
has,  as  the  figures  prove,  become  that  of  making  political 
and  administrative  provision  for  units  of  a  population  of 
which  a  very  large  portion  has  come  to  America  without 
sound  and  well-fixed  political  traditions.  This  is  not  to 
say  that  the  alien  element  is  wholly  or  even  mainly  respon- 
sible for  the  fact  that  the  government  of  great  cities  is 
America's  "one  conspicuous  failure."  No  American  city 
has  had  its  affairs  more  consistently  mismanaged,  or  has 
been  able  to  develop  fewer  wholesome  municipal  traditions, 
than  Philadelphia;  yet  the  foreign-born  element  in  the 
population  of  Philadelphia  is  much  weaker  than  it  is  in 
any  of  the  other  cities  of  the  largest  class.  Nevertheless, 
the  fact  that  the  alien-born  bulk  large  in  nearly  all  American 
cities  of  any  considerable  size  does  complicate  the  problems 
of  municipal  government.  It  can  hardly  be  true,  for 
example,  that  the  influence  of  heredity  can  affect  the  busi- 
ness aptitudes,  the  tastes,  and  even  the  ideals  of  races,  and 
yet  be  without  bearing  upon  their  political  propensities. 
A  considerable  proportion  of  those  who  have  come  to  America 
during  the  last  half-century  are  men  who  did  not  possess 


1  The  best  succinct  discussion,  based,  however,  on  the  census  figures 
of  1890,  is  in  A.  F.  Weber's  Growth  of  Cities  in  the  Nineteenth  Century, 
304-310.  For  more  extended  considerations,  see  P.  F.  Hall's  Immigra- 
tion (New  York,  1906),  especially  chs.  iv.  and  vii. ;  R.  Mayo-Smith,  Emi- 
gration and  Immigration  (New  York,  1904) ;  the  report  of  the  Senate 
Committee  on  Immigration,  57  Cong.,  2  sess.,  No.  62  (1902) ;  and  the 
annual  reports  of  the  Commissioner-General  of  Immigration.  A  List  of 
Books  on  Immigration  was  issued  by  the  Library  of  Congress  in  1907. 
See  also  W.  S.  Bennet  on  "The  Effect  of  Immigration  on  Politics,"  and 
Grace  Abbot  on  "The  Immigrant  and  Municipal  Politics/'  in  Proceedings 
of  the  National  Municipal  League,  1909,  pp.  142-156. 


36 

voting  rights  in  their  own  lands,  and  whose  fathers  before 
them  did  not  have  such  rights.  As  the  discreet  and  sober 
use  of  the  ballot  is  something  not  to  be  learned  in  a  day  or 
even  in  a  generation,  it  is  not  a  matter  for  surprise,  then, 
if  alien-born  voters  have  often  proved  easy  prey  to  the 
sophistry  and  cajolery  of  claptrap  politicians.  To  a  suc- 
cessful exploitation  of  the  foreign-born  voters  many  of  the 
worst  factors  in  urban  politics  have  been  indebted  for 
advancement. 

The  poiiti-  The  new  citizen  has  neither  political  traditions  nor 
tio^oUhe*"  prejudices.  His  eye  is  on  the  present  rather  than  on  the 
aUen-  past.  Being  unable  to  go  to  sure  sources  of  information 

concerning  his  new  political  duties,  he  must  take  such 
misguiding  authorities  as  come  to  him.  These  are,  too 
often,  the  hired  henchman  of  his  own  race,  the  newspaper 
of  his  own  language  (which  is  frequently  kept  in  existence 
by  patronage  from  the  party  in  power),  or  the  native-born 
political  roundsmen  who  cultivate  his  confidence  for  their 
own  ends.  All  these  make  it  appear  to  him  that  his  own 
immediate  advantage  can  be  best  served  by  following  the 
counsel  which  they  give ;  and,  being  led  to  believe  that 
individual  interest  is  the  only  motive  which  actuates  Ameri- 
can-born voters,  he  is  quite  liable  to  let  himself  be  thus 
exploited.  We  have  the  testimony  of  seasoned  campaigners 
that  the  alien-born  voter  is  inclined  to  think  for  himself  if 
he  gets  the  opportunity;  but  too  often  he  does  not  secure 
even  that  small  amount  of  fair  information  which  is  neces- 
sary to  furnish  food  for  thought.  As  a  rule,  practically  all 
that  he  gets  concerning  the  facts  of  the  municipal  situation 
comes  to  him  in  such  form  that  it  leads  to  one  conclusion 
only.  It  is  not  that  the  foreign-born  voter  is  indiscriminat- 
ing,  or  that  he  always  prefers  to  vote  for  one  of  his  own 
race  or  religion.  Experience  has  proved  that  he  cannot 
always  be  stampeded  by  appeals  to  class  prejudice,  or 


THE  SOCIAL  STRUCTURE   OF  THE   CITY  37 

delivered  blindly  to  the  support  of  some  political  faction. 
Given  a  fair  chance,  he  is,  according  to  authoritative  testi- 
mony,' a  voter  of  at  least  normal  independence.  If  he  has 
too  often  proved  to  be  the  tool  of  the  exploiter,  it  is  largely 
because  a  system  of  partisan  nominations  and  a  beclouded 
ballot  have  given  the  latter  a  redoubtable  position.  Loyalty 
to  some  social  idea  or  custom  which  aliens  have  brought 
with  them  from  their  own  lands,  moreover,  sometimes  out- 
weighs their  aversion  to  boss-domination.  Time  and  again, 
in  cities  like  New  York  and  Chicago  it  has  been  found  impos- 
sible to  to  get  various  bodies  of  foreign-born  citizens  to  range 
themselves  on  the  side  of  honest  and  decent  city  government, 
owing  to  inter-racial  jealousies  and  a  fear  that  a  change  of 
administration  would  mean  interference  with  their  Sunday 
recreations  or  other  social  customs. 

In  any  case,  the  presence  of  the  large  alien  element  in  urban 
areas  gives  the  cities  of  the  United  States  a  prime  interest 
in  the  terms  of  the  naturalization  law,  in  the  rigid  enforce- 
ment of  this  statute,  in  all  regulations  pertaining  to  the 
selection  of  immigrants,  and,  indeed,  in  every  matter  relat- 
ing to  the  immigration  policy  of  the  nation.  The  enormous 
assimilating  power  of  the  American  people  has  often  been 
commented  upon  by  students  of  sociology ;  but  it  is  not  by 
the  American  people  as  a  whole  that  this  process  is  per- 
formed. Most  of  the  task  falls  upon  the  larger  cities  of 
the  country,  and  it  would  therefore  be  surprising  if  mu- 
nicipal institutions  did  not  in  some  degree  feel  the  strain. 

A  unit  of  population  constituting  a  large  city,  when  con-  The  dy 
trasted  with  a  unit  of  equal  size  drawn  from  rural  districts, 
shows  marked  differences  in  its  birth,  marriage,  and  death  lation 
rates.1     In  the  matter  of  births  it  seems  to  be  generally 

1  Accurate  statistics  relating  to  vital  progress  (that  is,  to  the  birth, 
marriage,  and  death  rates)  are  not  available  for  the  whole  United  States, 
but  only  for  what  is  officially  termed  the  "registration  area."  This 


38 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


1.  Birth- 
rates. 


2.  Mar- 
riage-rates. 


true  that  the  number  per  thousand  of  population  is  almost 
always  greater  in  urban  than  in  rural  communities.  In- 
deed, it  has  been  laid  down  as  a  working  rule  that  the 
birth-rate  varies  directly  with  density  of  population  and 
inversely  with  sparseness.  A  superficial  explanation  of  the 
situation  in  America  may  be  found  in  the  fact  that  aliens, 
among  whom  the  birth-rate  is  high,  are  numerous  in  urban 
populations ;  but  that  would  not  explain  why  the  birth- 
rate is  larger  among  the  native-born  in  cities  than  among 
the  same  element  in  rural  districts.  The  real  explanation 
of  this  disparity,  as  of  many  other  social  phenomena,  is 
probably  economic.  Since  the  national  birth-rate  is  to  a 
considerable  extent  dependent  upon  general  economic  con- 
ditions, rising  in  times  of  prosperity  and  falling  in  times  of 
depression,  it  is  more  than  likely  that  the  higher  birth-rate 
of  the  urban  community  connects  itself  with  the  city's 
superiority  over  the  rural  district  in  point  of  wage-earning 
power  per  capita.1 

The  urban  marriage-rate  per  10,000  of  population  is 
also  considerably  higher  than  the  rural.  This  is  accounted 
for  in  part  by  the  fact  that  the  city  is  proportionately 
stronger  in  persons  of  marriageable  age,  in  part  by  the 
greater  accuracy  with  which  marriage  records  and  statistics 
are  kept  there,  and  in  part  by  the  fact  that  many  marriages 
which  ought  to  go  into  rural  statistics  are  credited  to  the 
city  in  which  the  ceremony  happens  to  have  been  performed. 
The  economic  factor  of  greater  income-earning  power  per 
individual  also  has  its  influence. 


area,  which  covers  most  of  the  Eastern  and  Middle,  some  of  the  Western, 
and  parts  of  a  few  Southern  states,  comprises  slightly  over  one-half  of 
the  total  population  of  the  Union. 

*But  this  is  a  matter  upon  which  demographical  authorities  widely 
disagree.  An  interesting  discussion  of  the  matter  by  C.  A.  Verrijn-Stuart 
may  be  found  in  the  Bulletin  de  Vinstitut  Internationale  de  statistique,  xiii 
(1903),  357-368. 


THE  SOCIAL  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  CITY 


39 


The  city,  as  is  well  known,  has  a  death-rate  per  thousand  3.  Death- 
very  much  above  that  of  the  country,  a  social  phenomenon 
which  seems  to  have  held  true  in  all  periods  and  in  all 
countries.  It  was  the  decimating  urban  death-rate  of  the 
Middle  Ages  and  the  early  modern  centuries  that  kept  the 
cities  from  making  substantial  headway  in  growth  of  popu- 
lation. In  London  the  ordinary  death-rate  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  is  estimated  to  have  been  about  fifty  per- 
sons per  thousand  of  population  each  year ;  and  it  was  not 
till  about  1800  that  the  annual  death-rate  went  below  the 
annual  birth-rate,  thereby  permitting  the  city  to  achieve 
some  growth  through  natural  increase.  In  this  respect 
London  was  not  unique  among  European  cities;  on  the 
contrary,  her  showing  was  probably  better  than  that  of  the 
other  great  centres.  Nor  was  the  situation  very  different 
in  America.  In  1700  the  death-rate  of  Boston  was  thirty- 
four  per  thousand ;  in  1900  it  had  dropped  to  less  than 
nineteen.  The  enormous  advances  made  by  the  science  of 
medicine,  including  improvements  in  sanitation,  and  prog- 
ress in  personal  hygiene,  in  arrangements  for  preventing  the 
spread  of  infectious  diseases,  and  in  preventive  medical  science 
generally,  —  all  this  has  cut  down  the  urban  death-rate  in 
every  large  American  city  during  the  last  three  decades.1 

1  The  decline  in  the  average  death-rates  of  some  large  American  cities 
may  be  seen  in  the  following  table  of  deaths  per  thousand  of  population, 
which  has  been  compiled  from  the  reports  of  the  United  States  Census 
Bureau :  — 


1881 

1886 

1891 

1896 

1901 

ClTT 

TO 

TO 

TO 

TO 

TO 

1885 

1890 

1895 

1900 

1905 

New  York  

27.5 

25.8 

246 

203 

189 

Chicago      

21.5 

19.5 

20.6 

15.2 

14.2 

Philadelphia    .... 

22.3 

20.6 

21.1 

19.2 

18.1 

Boston  

24.9 

23.5 

23.6 

20.9 

18.8 

40 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Causes  of 
the  high 
urban 
death-rate. 


The  death- 
rate  as  a 
barometer 
of  adminis- 
trative effi- 
ciency. 


But,  with  it  all,  the  city  death-rate  continues  at  every 
stage  of  human  life  to  be  higher  than  that  of  the  rural 
district.  Especially  is  this  true,  as  one  might  expect, 
among  children  under  five  years  of  age.  In  larger  cities 
the  infant  mortality  is  from  twice  to  three  times  that  of 
rural  areas  having  an  equal  number  of  children;  in  the 
case  of  children  under  one  year  of  age  the  discrepancy  is  very 
much  greater.  Many  circumstances  combine  to  bring 
about  this  situation.  The  poverty,  the  cramped  quarters, 
and  the  general  lack  of  even  elementary  necessities  with 
which  the  population  of  congested  urban  districts  has  to 
contend  account  for  much  of  it.  It  is  the  tenement  wards 
of  the  large  city  that  make  the  figures  of  infant  mortality 
what  they  are.  The  employment  of  married  women,  par- 
ticularly of  the  poorer  classes,  in  wearing  industrial  occu- 
pations is  also  a  factor  of  importance,  as  is  shown  by  the 
heavy  infant  mortality  of  those  cities  in  which  textile  in- 
dustries prevail.1  In  any  event,  much  of  the  heavy  loss 
of  population  in  its  earlier  years  is  admittedly  preventable ; 
its  continuance  is  due  largely  to  public  failure  to  realize 
the  seriousness  of  the  situation  and  to  official  apathy  in 
the  attempts  made  to  remedy  it.2  It  has  been  demonstrated, 
for  example,  that  the  annual  infant  mortality  in  large  cities 
can  be  greatly  reduced  by  strict  inspection  and  control  of 
the  milk  supply,  yet  this  is  a  matter  which  in  many  com- 
munities has  received  but  half-hearted  attention  from  the 
municipal  authorities. 

Of  all  conservation  measures  none  can  be  more  worthy 
than  those  which  have  for  their  end  the  conservation  of 
human  life.  It  is  in  the  infant  mortality  of  the  cities,  large 

1  See  the  interesting  table  printed  in  F.  J.  Goodnow's  Municipal  Gov- 
ernment (New  York,  1909),  30-31. 

2  National  Conservation  Commission,  Bulletin  of  the  Committee  of  One 
Hundred  on  National  Health;    being  a  Report  on  National  Vitality,  its 
Waste  and  Conservation,  prepared  by  Professor  Irving  Fisher,  July,  1909. 


THE  SOCIAL  STRUCTURE   OF  THE  CITY  41 

and  small,  that  the  greatest  saving  can  be  made ;  for  in  some 
respects  the  infant  death-rate  is  a  barometer  of  the  efficiency 
of  a  city's  administration  in  matters  of  health  and  sanitation. 
Concentration  of  population  engenders  a  heavy  drain  upon 
the  vitality  of  a  race,  and  only  by  lavish  outlays  of  skill, 
energy,  and  money  can  this  drain  be  held  in  check.  The 
water-supply  system,  the  sewerage  arrangements,  the  parks 
and  recreation  grounds,  the  schools,  the  transit  facilities  in  so 
far  as  they  operate  to  relieve  density,  the  public-health 
department,  the  street-cleaning  service,  the  inspection  of 
food,  —  nearly  every  branch  of  city  administration  reflects 
its  efficiency  or  its  inefficiency  upon  the  figures  of  infant 
mortality.  Much  as  all  these  services  have  been  improved, 
—  and  the  improvement  has  shown  itself  in  the  lower 
mortality  rates  of  the  past  few  decades, —  the  city  still 
loses,  by  its  high  death-rate,  most  of  what  it  gains  through 
an  excess  of  births.  Apart  from  the  infant  mortality,  the 
difference  between  the  urban  and  the  rural  districts  in  the 
matter  of  death-rates  is  not  great.  Among  adults  a  large 
proportion  of  the  city's  excess  can  be  traced  to  the  nerve- 
racking  strain  of  city  life  and  the  larger  accidental  death- 
rate  of  the  urban  community.  Most  of  the  hazardous  and 
extra-hazardous  occupations  of  industry  and  commerce 
are  urban  employments,  and  many  serious  diseases  which 
are  at  least  semi-accidental,  so  far  as  the  usual  methods  of 
contracting  them  go,  are  peculiarly  the  diseases  of  city 
dwellers. 

Surveying  the   field   of  vital  progress  as  a  whole,  one  The  city's 
sees  clearly  that  the  rural  districts  may  make  a  greater  to'the 
net  contribution  to  the  growth  of  national  population  than 
do  the  cities.     Where  this  is  so,  the  urbanization  of  a  coun- 
try ought,  in  the  absence  of  immigration,  to  mean  a  slower 
rate  of  national  growth.     Possibly  the  increasing  slowness 
of  England's  decennial  growth  in  population  may  be  in 


42  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

part  explained  by  the  steady  drift  of  the  English  population 
into  urban  centres. 

Phyaicai  A  good  deal  used  to  be  said  and  written  about  the  de- 

bilitating effect  of  urban  life  upon  individual  physique. 
Nothing  seemed  easier  to  establish  than  a  priori  conclusions 
as  to  the  superior  physical  development  of  the  rural  popu- 
lation. It  was,  indeed,  so  far  taken  for  granted  that  the 
rural  militiaman  was  physically  superior  to  the  townsman, 
that  one  of  the  stock  arguments  for  the  encouragement  of 
English  agriculture  by  corn  laws  and  other  protective  legis- 
lation was  the  necessity  of  preserving  that  yeomanry  of 
England  which  was  alleged  to  furnish  the  military  sinew  of 
the  kingdom.  There  are,  of  course,  a  great  many  reasons 
why  the  per  capita  physical  attainment  of  the  country 
ought,  if  it  could  be  measured,  to  be  greater  than  that  of 

The  older  the  town.  That  minute  division  of  labor  in  urban  indus- 
tries which  even  in  Adam  Smith's  day  required  a  man  to 
spend  his  lifetime  in  making  the  nineteenth  part  of  a  pin, 
nowadays  gives  him  an  even  more  specialized  task  in  pro- 
duction. Most  urban  occupations  develop  only  a  very 
small  part  of  the  worker's  physical  powers,  whereas  the 
rural  employments  encourage  bodily  versatility  and  all- 
round  physical  development. 

what  the         When  one  attempts  to  adduce  accurate  statistical  evidence 

dose.^  of  this  rural  prowess  in  point  of  physical  development, 
however,  one  does  not  find  the  expected  proofs  so  readily 
forthcoming.  Statistical  data  to  prove  or  to  disprove  the 
claim  are  not  to  be  had  in  America,  for  there  is  in  this  country 
no  arrangement  for  recording  the  physical  measurements  of 
typical  sections  of  the  population.  Prisoners  in  jails, 
athletes  in  training,  applicants  for  places  on  city  police 
forces,  newly  enlisted  men  in  the  army  or  navy,  are  all 
measured  and  the  results  are  put  on  paper;  but  these 
classes,  even  taken  together,  form  so  small  a  part  of  the 


THE   SOCIAL  STRUCTURE   OF  THE   CITY  43 

national  population  that  generalization  from  their  measure- 
ments would  be  unfair  and  inconclusive.  We  must  go  to 
those  countries  of  continental  Europe,  such  as  France, 
Germany,  and  Italy,  where  universal  military  service  is 
compulsory,  and  where,  in  consequence,  practically  the 
whole  adult  male  population  is  subjected,  section  by  section, 
to  physical  examinations  of  exactly  the  same  scope  and 
nature.  Now,  the  evidence  that  comes  from  all  these 
countries  —  and  it  is  based  upon  the  measurements  of  many 
millions  of  men  drawn  from  all  sections  during  the  last 
quarter-century  —  gives  no  conclusive  support  to  the  notion 
that  city  life  is  physically  debilitating.  On  the  contrary, 
the  percentage  of  those  who  are  rejected  each  year  for  failure 
to  meet  the  minimum  requirements  in  height,  weight,  chest 
measurement,  and  so  forth,  is  in  many  cases  higher  among 
recruits  from  the  rural  areas  than  among  those  drafted  from 
the  population  of  the  large  cities.  It  may  be,  of  course, 
that  many  of  those  who  enter  the  army  from  the  cities  were 
born  in  the  country;  but  that  factor  alone  would  scarcely 
account  for  the  urban  superiority  which  the  army  statistics 
often  show.  It  ought  to  be  added,  also,  that  this  evidence 
which  disputes  popular  notions  concerning  the  superiority 
of  rural  life  as  a  developer  of  physical  strength  and  stamina 
receives  corroboration  in  the  expressed  opinions  of  nearly 
every  one  who  has  given  the  matter  careful  observation. 
Military  leaders  have  frequently,  in  the  great  wars  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  commented  upon  the  superior  powers 
of  physical  endurance  displayed  by  urban  regiments.  If 
the  urbanization  of  a  people  means  physical  degeneracy, 
the  evidence  now  obtainable  gives  no  conclusive  proof 
of  it.1  Health,  strength,  and  vigor  evidently  depend  less 

1  Much  has  been  written  on  both  sides  of  this  question,  chiefly  by  Pro- 
fessor Brentano  of  Munich  and  other  German  economists.  A  summary 
of  the  data  may  be  found  in  Weber's  Growth  of  Cities,  pp.  382-397. 


44  GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN   CITIES 

on  place  of  residence  and  occupation  than  upon  cleanli- 
ness, variety  of  diet,  and  prompt  attention  to  minor 
bodily  ills. 

Relative  The  balance-sheet  of  a  people's  intellectual  attainment 

attainment.  *s  something  that  cannot  very  well  be  cast  in  figures. 
Having  no  gauge  of  popular  erudition,  one  can  make  only 
a  general  comparison  of  urban  with  rural  populations  as 
regards  the  percentage  of  illiterates  found  in  each.  The 
census  of  1900  showed  that,  whereas  17.4  per  cent  of  the 
total  white  population  of  the  United  States  over  ten  years  of 
age  was  classed  as  illiterate,  the  proportion  in  cities  of  over 
25,000  was  only  4.4.  per  cent,  and  this  despite  the  presence 
of  the  large  alien  element  in  them.1  This  greater  freedom 
of  the  urban  centres  from  illiteracy  is  due  in  part  to  their 
superior  day-school  facilities  and  to  their  better  enforcement 
of  the  laws  relating  to  compulsory  education;  but  to  a 
greater  degree  it  is  perhaps  attributable  to  the  supplemen- 
tary agencies  of  crude  education  in  which  the  city  abounds, 
—  the  night  school,  the  neighborhood  house,  and,  by  no 
means  least,  the  daily  newspaper.  In  the  city,  moreover, 
the  pressure  put  upon  the  illiterate  is  very  great  ;  even  the 
least  remunerative  employments  open  to  youths  require 
that  the  employee  shall  be  able  to  read  and  write. 
is  the  intel-  It  may  be  urged  that  although  the  city  may  thus  make  a 
better  showing  at  the  lowest  rung  of  the  intellectual  ladder, 


assumed  or    ^  ^oes  no*  necessar^7  follow  that  the  general  average  of 

real?  intelligence  or  of  mental  achievement  in  it  is  any  greater 

than  in  the  country.     We  have  been  assured,  at  any  rate, 

that  the  city-dweller's  assumed   superiority  in    knowledge 

is  only  superficial,  that  "scattered  and  unrelated  fragments 

There  is  also  an  excellent  study  of  the  whole  matter,  based  on  data  gath- 
ered during  the  Boer  War,  in  the  British  Blue  Book  of  1904  on  "  Physical 
Deterioration.  '  ' 

1  Bureau  of  the  Census,  Bulletin,  No.  26,  "Illiteracy  in  the  United 
States"  (Washington,  1905). 


THE   SOCIAL  STRUCTURE   OF  THE   CITY  45 

of  half-baked  information  form  a  stock  of  '  knowledge '  with 
which  the  townsman's  glib  tongue  enables  him  to  present  a 
showy  intellectual  shop-front." 1  Most  of  the  best  and 
strongest  intellectual  work  done  in  the  cities  is  performed; 
it  is  said,  by  rural-bred  men.  There  are,  however,  no  con- 
clusive ways  of  determining  the  extent  to  which  the  professed 
superiority  of  the  townsman  in  point  of  education  is  unwar- 
ranted; consequently  the  world  continues  to  take  him  at 
his  own  value.  If  it  be  true  that  education  is  largely  a 
matter  of  opportunity,  there  is  every  reason  why  the  citizens 
of  urban  communities  should  make  the  better  showing. 

Many  sermons  have  been  preached  upon  the  inferiority  standards 
of  urban  moral  standards ;  but,  like  the  allegations  concern-  °  morals* 
ing  the  enfeebled  physical  development  of  the  city-born, 
these  indictments  rest  for  the  most  part  upon  little  more 
than  biassed  and  uncomprehensive  observation.2  There 
are  no  trustworthy  indices  of  public  morals ;  for  the 
standards  of  different  races  are  never  fairly  comparable, 
nor  are  those  of  different  sections  of  the  same  people.  As 
presumptive  evidence  bearing  on  the  morality  of  a  community 
the  statistics  of  the  criminal  courts  may  be  brought  forward ; 
and  in  the  light  of  such  tests  the  city  makes  a  rather  poor 
showing.  In  the  United  States  the  cities  are  commonly 
debited  with  two  or  three  times  their  due  share  of  the  nation's 
convicted  criminals.  There  are,  however,  some  things  to  be 
noted  in  extenuation  of  this  discreditable  urban  achievement. 
The  cities,  especially  the  larger  ones,  are,  as  every  one 
knows,  the  habitat  of  malefactors  whom  they  have  not 
tutored  into  crime.  The  country  youth  of  vicious  disposi- 
tion is  pretty  sure  to  drift  where  his  propensities  can  find 


1  J.  A.  Hobson,  The  Evolution  of  Modern  Capitalism  (New  York,  1904), 
339. 

1  For  an  example,  see  Josiah  Strong,  The  Twentieth  Century  City  (New 
York,  1898). 


46  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

scope ;  but  the  city  which  must  bear  the  brunt  of  his  later 
criminal  record  is  not  the  author  of  his  waywardness.  It  is 
not  because  the  moral  plane  is  lower  in  the  urban  centres 
that  the  criminal  classes  gravitate  there ;  it  is  only  because 
density  of  population  affords  greater  opportunity  for  gain- 
ing the  emoluments  of  crime,  and  at  the  same  time  better 
chances  of  escaping  detection.  Crimes  against  the  person 
—  assaults  and  the  like  —  are  not  relatively  more  numerous 
in  the  city  than  in  the  rural  area;  but  the  city  is  more 
prolific  in  crimes  against  property,  such  as  burglary,  larceny, 
and  embezzlement,  for  the  obvious  reason  that  the  temp- 
tations to  these  offences  are  stronger  where  things  of  high 
value  are  thrust  continuously  before  the  eyes  of  the  covetous. 
In  the  city,  moreover,  the  vicissitudes  of  employment  are 
many.  Men  are  at  work  to-day  and  out  of  work  to-morrow ; 
hence  there  is  always  an  idle  element,  and  this  element  is, 
from  its  lack  of  honest  earnings,  under  pressure  to  transgress 
the  laws.  The  saloon,  the  opium-dive,  the  brothel,  and 
those  pawnbrokers  who  seek  their  profits  from  the  fruits 
of  thievery,  are  each  entitled  to  a  fair  share  in  the  responsi- 
bility for  the  city's  criminal  record ;  yet  they  are  all  ex- 
crescences upon  normal  urban  life  rather  than  essential 
features  of  it.1  Their  elimination  is,  however,  scarcely 
within  the  range  of  to-morrow's  possibilities ;  hence,  while 
Urban  cities  remain  what  they  are,  the  urban  crime  rate  is  likely  to 

growth  and  .  .  .    . 

the  increase    Continue  high. 

rune'  The  expanding  crime  ratio  of  the  United  States,  taken  as 

a  whole  during  the  last  two  or  three  decades,  has  given  rise 
to  serious  misgivings  in  the  minds  of  many  students  of 
social  statistics ;  but  this  development,  it  may  be  suggested, 
is  possibly  no  more  than  a  corollary  to  the  steady  shifting  of 

1  Those  who  are  interested  in  this  topic  will  find  a  readable  essay  on 
"Great  Cities,  and  their  Influence  for  Good  and  Evil "  in  Charles  Kingsley's 
Miscellanies  (2  vols.,  London,  1860),  II.  318-345. 


THE   SOCIAL  STRUCTURE   OF  THE   CITY  47 

the  population.  The  crime  ratio  of  the  larger  cities  is  much 
greater  than  that  of  the  rural  areas ;  and,  since  the  cities  grow 
much  more  rapidly  than  these  districts  do,  it  would  be  strange 
if  the  number  of  crimes  did  not  increase  with  greater  relative 
rapidity  than  the  population  of  the  Union  as  a  whole.  The 
progress  of  urban  concentration  is  doubtless  responsible  for 
much  of  the  national  growth  in  criminality ;  not,  however, 
because  the  growth  of  cities  tends  to  lower  the  entire  moral 
tone  of  a  people,  but  because  the  urban  centres  provide 
greater  scope  for  that  element  which,  whether  in  city  or 
in  country,  is  governed  in  its  activities  by  its  oppor- 
tunities. 

The  cities  of  the  United  States,  being  stronger  in  persons  Ownership 
of  productive  age  than  are  the  rural  areas,  ought  to  have  °  property< 
a  greater  income-earning  power  per  head  of  population. 
It  is  certain,  at  any  rate,  that  the  per  capita  wealth  of  the 
cities  far  exceeds  that  of  the  rural  communities.  Of  the 
total  wealth  of  the  United  States,  as  estimated  in  1900, 
the  urban  population  possessed  about  three-fourths,  or  more 
than  double  its  proportionate  share.  These  reckonings, 
however,  include  personal  as  well  as  real  property.  If  one 
takes  only  real  property  as  the  basis  of  calculation,  and 
estimates  the  relative  number  of  those  who  own  property 
and  those  who  do  not,  one  gets  a  very  different  showing; 
for  the  percentage  of  those  who  own  real  property  is  much 
larger  in  the  rural  districts.  It  is  true  that  the  real  signifi- 
cance of  the  proportion  of  "farm  families  owning  their 
homes,"  as  given  in  the  census  returns  (nearly  sixty-five 
per  cent,  by  the  enumeration  of  1900),  is  somewhat  impaired 
by  the  fact  that  much  of  this  "ownership"  is  in  form  rather 
than  in  reality ;  for  heavily  mortgaged  farm-homes  are  no 
rarity  in  the  agricultural  states  of  this  country.  But,  with 
all  due  allowance  for  this  fact,  the  real-propertied  element 
in  the  rural  population  of  the  United  States  is  much  larger 


48  GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 

than  that  in  the  urban.  It  seems,  indeed,  to  be  a  law  of 
urban  concentration  that  the  more  congested  the  popula- 
tion the  lower  becomes  the  ratio  of  home-owning  families. 
In  Baltimore  this  ratio  was  27.9  per  cent,  in  Chicago  25.1  per 
cent,  in  Boston  18.9  per  cent,  in  New  York  12.1  per  cent, 
and  in  the  crowded  boroughs  of  Manhattan  and  the  Bronx 
only  5.9  per  cent. 

Property  This  marked  difference  in  the  ratio  of  home-owners  to 
^rvatism.  total  population,  as  between  city  and  rural  areas,  is  one  of 
great  social  and  political  importance.  That  indefinable 
inspiration  to  thrift  which  John  Stuart  Mill  called  the 
"magic  of  property,"  and  which  he  credited  with  the  alchemy 
of  turning  sand  into  gold,  is  more  general  and  more  effective 
in  country  than  in  town.  It  is  well  known  that  a  wide- 
spread ownership  of  property  makes  for  conservatism  and 
soberness  in  popular  thought,  whereas  the  propertyless 
element  is  liable  to  be  radical  in  its  political,  social,  and  eco- 
nomic views.  The  history  of  nations  affords  plenty  of  evidence 
that  urban  centres  are  impatient  of  the  slow  course  which 
social  and  political  institutions  commonly  take  in  working 
out  their  own  evolution,  and  hence  that  their  growth  is  sure 
to  promote  radicalism  in  all  departments  of  thought.  It 
has  done  so  in  the  United  States  during  the  last  twenty 
or  thirty  years.  Urban  concentration  means,  accordingly, 
that  the  landless  man  rises  to  supremacy  in  the  voting-lists, 
that  the  property-owning  element  dwindles  in  relative  im- 
portance, and  that  through  this  wide  difference  an  antag- 
onism of  interest  between  the  two  classes  is  likely  to  be 
aroused.  The  rural  district,  in  its  broad  diffusion  of 
ownerships,  possesses  a  strong  incentive  to  sober  habits  of 
thought ;  the  large  city  does  not  have  this  advantage, 
other  points  There  are  many  other  viewpoints  from  which  the  urban 
son.  and  rural  populations  of  the  United  States  might  be  subjected 

to  fair  comparison,  but  enough  have  been  used  to  show  that 


THE   SOCIAL  STRUCTURE   OF  THE   CITY  49 

marked  differences  exist  in  the  social  textures  of  the  two. 
Compared  from  any  single  point  of  view,  these  differences 
are  perhaps  not  of  very  much  consequence;  the  mere  fact 
that  the  American  city  is  stronger  in  its  percentage  of 
females  or  weaker  in  its  ratio  of  illiterates  scarcely  suffices 
to  give  urban  populations  any  distinctive  social  coloring. 
Taken  together,  however,  the  variations  show  a  difference 
in  make-up  both  great  and  important.  It  is  to  be  remem- 
bered, moreover,  that  some  of  the  most  marked  discrepancies, 
quite  visible  to  the  naked  eye,  are  not  statistically  comput- 
able. Differences  between  urban  and  rural  populations  in 
their  versatility  of  interests,  in  their  breadth  of  intellectual 
horizon,  in  their  average  qualities  of  initiative,  perseverance, 
and  constancy,  in  their  capacity  to  develop  and  to  follow  safe 
ideals,  —  these  are  things  which  cannot  be  set  forth  in 
columns  of  numerals.  In  the  public  imagination  the  city 
looms  large  as  a  place  where  sordid  and  material  motives  fill 
the  minds  and  govern  the  acts  of  men,  a  place  of  excessive 
individualism,  where  neighborhood  feeling  is  almost  absent, 
and  where,  through  the  incessant  shifting  of  the  people, 
no  neighborhood  traditions  can  ever  become  firmly  rooted. 
Its  population  is  restive,  impulsive,  intolerant  of  delay  (yet 
docile  enough  in  its  continued  submission  to  public  abuses), 
laying  too  little  stress  upon  the  family  as  the  ultimate 
social  unit  and  too  much  upon  artificial  organizations  that 
are  more  social  in  aim  than  in  ultimate  accomplishment.  If 
all  these  traits  could  be  weighed  in  the  balance  and  their 
intensity  determined,  the  real  extent  of  the  modern  city's 
influence  upon  national  life,  and  of  its  departure  from  the 
rural  unit  in  texture  and  problems,  could  be  more  accurately 
measured. 

It  is  in  the  great  cities  of  the  land  that  the  extremes  of  Place  of  the 
national  life  come  face  to  face.     There  it  is  that  the  high-  national 
est  culture  stares  down  the  street  at  unalloyed  ignorance.  Ufe< 


50  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

The  extremes  of  personal  wealth  and  poverty  are  also  there. 
If  one  desires  the  best  in  men  of  science,  of  art,  of  industry, 
one  will  find  them  in  the  large  city ;  if  one  wants  the  worst 
types  of  illiteracy,  depravity,  and  incidence,  one  will  find 
them  there  too.  It  is  from  this  heterogeneity  that  the 
population  of  the  city  derives  its  individualism;  it  is  this 
that  accounts  for  the  sang-froid  with  which  one  half  of  it 
regards  the  way  in  which  the  other  half  lives.  As  a  fair 
consequence  of  this  oil-and-water  amalgam  of  its  population, 
the  city  will  undoubtedly  continue  to  present  both  the 
highest  achievements  in  political  virtue  and  the  basest 
spectacles  of  political  vice.  Across  its  warp  of  sacking,  as 
Mr.  Bryce  puts  it,  are  woven  threads  of  silver  and  gold. 
The  crucible  Into  this  great  melting-pot  of  American  municipal  life 
'  the  baser  elements  of  indifference,  ignorance,  and  greed, 
together  with  the  finer  elements  of  intelligence,  public 
spirit,  and  self-sacrifice,  must  be  poured,  and  out  of  the 
mass  will  come  the  composite  of  American  citizenship. 
The  modern  metropolis,  whether  in  America  or  elsewhere, 
is  neither  an  Athens  nor  a  Gomorrah ;  it  is  both  rolled  into 
one.  In  the  rural  community,  which  has  the  features  of 
neither  one  nor  the  other,  the  problem  of  maintaining  a 
reasonable  standard  of  ideals  and  achievements  is  easier 
than  in  the  city,  where  these  things  must  be  determined 
by  the  might  of  the  stronger  among  its  modern  Hellenes 
and  Philistines.1  That  the  city's  influence  upon  the  political, 
social,  and  economic  ideals  of  the  whole  people  ought  by 
every  effort  to  be  thrown  into  the  proper  channel  is  of  the 

1  "The  city  is  the  spectroscope  of  society;  it  analyzes  and  sifts  the 
population,  separating  and  classifying  the  diverse  elements.  The  entire 
progress  of  civilization  is  a  process  of  differentiation,  and  the  city  is  the 
greatest  differentiator.  The  mediocrity  of  the  country  is  transformed  by 
the  city  into  the  highest  talent  or  the  lowest.  Genius  is  often  born  in 
the  country,  but  it  is  brought  to  light  and  developed  by  the  city."  —  A.  F. 
WEBER,  The  Growth  of  Cities  in  the  Nineteenth  Century  (New  York,  1899), 
442. 


THE   SOCIAL  STRUCTURE   OF  THE   CITY  51 

most  vital  importance ;  for  the  urban  population  is  in  ef- 
fect more  influential  than  its  numerical  strength  implies. 
As  the  element  which  supplies  the  leaders  of  thought,  and 
which  through  its  press  has  an  incalculable  influence  upon 
the  moulding  of  public  opinion,  it  must  be  credited  with 
far  more  than  forty-five  per  cent  of  the  responsibility  for 
the  successes  or  the  failures  of  American  political  life. 
The  problems  of  the  city  are  not,  therefore,  the  problems 
of  its  own  citizens  alone.  The  proper  solution  of  them  is 
of  vital  moment  to  all  who  value  American  ideals;  for  the 
ideals  of  a  nation  are  determined  by  the  most  influential 
among  various  elements  of  its  population,  and,  being  so 
determined,  they  are  in  constant  process  of  change.  The 
course  of  alteration  is  unheralded  by  any  blast  of  trumpets, 
and  it  often  evades  even  the  notice  of  trained  observers. 
Transformations  in  the  political  or  the  social  psychology  of 
a  people  proceed  insidiously.  Hence  it  is  that  a  general 
betterment  of  popular  ideals  may  descend  on  a  land,  like 
as  an  angel,  unawares,  or  a  deterioration  may  come  even 
as  a  thief  in  the  night. 

As  the  city,  then,  with  all  that  it  expresses  and  implies,  True  civic 
must  be  the  controlling  factor  in  the  national  life  of  the  future,  patnotlsm- 
there  is  no  service  more  truly  patriotic  than  that  of  helping 
to  make  it  a  better  place  for  men  to  live  in.  True  patriotism, 
as  has  been  well  said,  requires  "not  only  that  a  man  shall 
be  ready  to  make  the  supreme  sacrifice  for  his  country's 
salvation,  but  that  he  shall  stand  ever-ready  to  devote  his 
time  and  talents  to  the  less  conspicuous  but  equally  momen- 
tous duty  of  maintaining  public  order,  protecting  private 
property,  and  preserving  the  lives  of  his  fellows  against  the 
dangers  which  lurk  in  foul  tenements,  in  unclean  food,  and 
in  that  whole  field  of  civic  administration  whose  mismanage- 
ment leaves  a  trail  of  misery  through  the  habitations  of 
the  poor."  To  make  the  city,  as  Henry  Drummond  has 


52  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

reminded  us,  is  what  we  are  here  for.  "He  who  makes  the 
city  makes  the  world.  For  though  men  may  make  cities, 
it  is  after  all  the  cities  which  make  men.  Whether  our 
national  life  is  great  or  mean,  whether  our  social  virtues 
are  mature  or  stunted,  whether  our  sons  are  vicious  or 
moral,  whether  religion  is  possible  or  impossible,  depends 
upon  the  city.  To  the  reformer,  the  philanthropist,  the 
economist,  the  politician,  this  vision  of  the  city  is  the  great 
classic  of  social  literature." 

REFERENCES 

Reliable  data  regarding  the  social  structure  of  the  American  city  may 
be  had  most  conveniently  from  the  various  Bulletins  which  the  United 
States  Bureau  of  the  Census  issues  during  the  years  following  each  de- 
cennial enumeration.  These  bulletins,  which  take  up  such  topics  as  the 
distribution  of  population  by  sex,  age,  and  nativity,  the  statistics  of 
illiteracy,  the  progress  of  population  as  disclosed  by  the  birth  and  death 
rates,  the  ownership  of  property,  and  many  other  matters,  usually  in- 
clude some  interesting  discussions  of  the  figures  which  they  contain. 
Two  excellent  monographs  dealing  with  the  sociological  anatomy  of  the 
modern  city  are  Paul  Meuriot's  Des  agglomerations  urbaines  dans  V Europe 
contemporaine  (Paris,  1897),  and  A.  F.  Weber's  Growth  of  Cities  in  the 
Nineteenth  Century  (New  York,  1899),  especially  ch.  v.  On  the  general 
questions  of  ethnic  structure,  no  work  approaches  in  value  Emile  Levas- 
seur's  La  population  fran^aise  (3  vols.,  Paris,  1889-1892). 

Books  dealing  with  the  social  texture  of  American  city  population  are 
H.  B.  Woolston's  Study  of  the  Population  of  Manhattanville  (New  York, 
1909) ;  F.  A.  BusheVs  Ethnic  Factors  in  the  Population  of  Boston  (New 
York,  1903) ;  and  E.  E.  Pratt's  Industrial  Causes  of  the  Congestion  of 
Population  in  New  York  City  (New  York,  1911).  The  last-named  volume 
contains  a  useful  bibliography.  Mention  should  also  be  made  of  T.  J. 
Jones's  Sociology  of  a  New  York  City  Block  (New  York,  1904),  which  is  a 
painstaking  study  of  real  value.  There  are  a  great  many  useful  tables  in 
the  volumes  relating  to  the  Pittsburgh  Survey,  issued  under  the  auspices  of 
the  Russell  Sage  Foundation.  Indeed,  the  supply  of  first-hand  material  now 
available  for  the  study  of  urban  sociology  is  so  extensive  that  any  attempt 
to  enumerate  all  of  it  would  constitute  a  formidable  task. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  CITY  AND  THE  STATE 

THE  American  city  is  a  municipal  corporation  created  Supremacy 
by  the  state  under  its  reserved  rights  of  internal  sovereignty :  state, 
it  derives  all  its  powers  from  state  laws,  and  it  is  subordinate 
in  all  its  activities  to  the  state's  authority.  It  is  one  of 
the  agents  which  the  state  uses  for  the  more  convenient 
administration  oil  local  government.  To  this  end,  the  city 
is  intrusiea  witn  only  suck  powers  as  the  legislature  may 
think  wise  to  confer,  and  even  in  such  grants  it  acquires 
no  vested  right.  Municipal  authority  may  be  enlarged, 
abridged,  or  entirely  withdrawn  by  the  legislature  at  pleas- 
ure. In  other  words,  the  state  authorities  have  the  right 
to  govern  the  city  lust  as  they  govern  anv  other  *vw.  within 
their  jurisdiction.  This  is  a  fundamental  principle  of 
American  law,  so  well  recognized  that  it  is  not  nowadays 
open  to  question.1 

But  upon  this  supremacy  of  the  state  legislature  in  all  mat-  Conatitu- 
ters  of  municipal  government  there  are  two  important  kinds  limitations, 
of  limitation :  (l)  those  restrictions  which  are  imposed  upon 
all  legislative  freedom  by  the  constitution    of  the  United 
States,  and  (2)  those  special  limitations  which  are  contained 
in  the  constitutions  of  the  various  states  themselves.     The 
federal  constitution,  for  example,  withholds  from  all  legis- 
lative bodies,  state  and  national?  the  power  to  take  private 
property  for  public  use  without  iust  compensation.     What 
a  state  itself  cannot,  Hn|  it  cannot  empower  anv  subordinate, 

1  Meriwether  v.  Garrett,  102  U.  S.  472,  printed  in  J.  H.  Beale's  Selec- 
tion of  Cases  on  Municipal  Corporations  (Cambridge,  1911),  54. 

53 


64  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

authority  to  do :  hence,  legislative  freedom  in  the  matter 
of  granting  powers  to  municipal  corporations  is  subjected 
to  some  very  important  checks.  More  important  and  far 
more  numerous  are  the  limitations  imposed  upon  the 
legislatures  of  states  by  their  own  constitutions.  In  the 
earlier  state  constitutions  these  restrictions  were  few;  in 
some  there  were  none  at  all  with  reference  to  municipal 
government.  By  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century, 
however,  the  disposition  to  insert  checks  upon  legislative 
interference  with  local  administration  had  become  so  marked 
that  whenever  state  constitutions  were  revised  some  such 
provisions  were  almost  invariably  inserted.  During  the 
last  fifty  or  sixty  years  this  tendency  has  grown  even  stronger, 
until  it  has  nowadays  come  to  be  taken  for  granted  that, 
whenever  a  state  adopts  a  new  constitution  or  revises  an 
old  one,  it  will  almost  certainly  use  the  opportunity  to  in- 
sert various  restrictive  clauses  relating  to  legislative  freedom 
in  matters  of  local  government. 

Their  Constitutional    limitations    upon    the    freedom    of    the 

legislature  to  deal  with  city  affairs  are  of  great  variety. 
Many  of  them  relate  to  the  form  of  city  charters  or  to  the 
methods  of  framing  them.  In  some  states  the  legislature  is 
forbidden  to  charter  cities  by  special  act;  in  others  it  is 
required  to  grant  all  charters  in  this  way.  Some  state 
constitutions  prohibit  changes  in  city  charters  unless  they 
are  made  with  the  consent  of  the  citizens ;  others  guarantee 
to  the  voters  of  cities  the  right  to  frame  their  own  charters 
and  to  enact  them  into  force  by  referenda  free  from  legis- 
lative interference,  —  in  other  words,  to  adopt  so-termed 
"home-rule"  charters.  A  common  form  of  limitation  pre- 
vents legislatures  from  giving  cities  undue  borrowing  powers^ 
or  from  empowering  municipalities  to  ftrftnt  pp-rpfttnal^ 
franchises  to  public-service  corporations  or  to  loan  their 
credit  to  private  enterprises. 


THE   CITY  AND  THE   STATE  55 

Clauses  forbidding  the  legislature  to  charter  cities  by  Prohibition 
special  law,  or  to  enact  special  legislation  for  individual 


cities,  have  found  their  way  into  the  constitutions  of  nearly 
a  score  of  states;  yet  both  these  prohibitions  have  proved 
to  be  capable  of  evasion.  The  Ohio  constitution  of  1851, 
for  example,  provided  that  the  state  legislature  should 
pass  no  special  acts  conferring  corporate  power,  but 
should  arrange  for  the  organization  of  cities  by  general 
laws,  and  should  give  to  all  laws  of  a  general  nature  uni- 
form operation  throughout  the  state.1  In  keeping  with 
these  wholesome  doctrines,  the  legislature  in  1852  enacted 
a  general  municipal  code  dividing  the  nine  cities  of  the 
state  into  two  classes  and  applying  somewhat  different 
provisions  to  these  classes.  It  was  not  long;r  however.  The  Ohio 
before  special  legislation  appeared  under  the  guise  of  further  e: 
classification  of  cities  :  when  it  was  desired  to  pass  an  act 
affecting  only  a  single  city,  the  legislation  was  wnr^jj^  an- 
as to  have  a  purely  local  application.2  In  course  of  time, 
accordingly,  the  two  classes  of  cities  came  to  be  subdivided 
into  various  grades  according  to  their  population,  until 
there  were  eleven  grades  in  all,  eight  of  them  containing 
only  one  city  each.3  With  these  cities  fixed  in  a  stated  cate- 

1  Art.  xii.  §§  1,  6;  art.  ii.  §  26. 

1  An  act  intended  for  Cincinnati,  passed  in  1868,  contained  the  follow- 
ing provision:  "The  city  council  of  any  city  of  the  first  class  having  a 
population  of  150,000  inhabitants,  wherein  a  public  avenue  of  not  less 
than  one  hundred  feet  in  width  is  now  projected  to  be  known  as  Gilbert 
Avenue,  is  hereby  authorized  to  issue  bonds  of  the  said  city  in  any  sum 
not  exceeding  $150,000."  Other  examples  may  be  found  in  Constitutional 
Home  Rule  for  Ohio  Cities,  a  report  issued  by  the  Municipal  Home  Rule 
Committee  of  the  Municipal  Association  of  Cleveland,  1912. 

*  The  gradations  were  as  follows  :  — 

CLASS  I 

Grade  1,  over  200,000  (Cincinnati). 
Grade  2,  from  90,000  to  200,000  (Cleveland). 
Grade  3,  from  31,500  to  90,000  (Toledo). 
Grade  4,  to  be  created  (none). 


66  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

gory,  the  legislature  was  able  to  handle  them  quite  as  if 
there  were  no  constitutional  restrictions  at  all.  For  fifty 
years,  from  1851  to  1902,  the  courts  of  Ohio  upheld  this 
procedure,  declining,  so  long  as  legislation  was  general  in 
form,  to  hold  it  unconstitutional  even  though  it  was  special 
in  fact.  In  1902,  however,  the  supreme  court  of  Ohio 
reversed  its  course,1  took  a  clear  ground  against  special 
legislation,  and  thereby  forced  the  legislature  to  enact  a 
new  municipal  code,  with  provisions  that  apply  uniformly 
to  all  Ohio  cities  having  populations  exceeding  5000 .2 
Evils  of  a  But  if  the  Ohio  situation  prior  to  1902  affords  an  excel- 
lent illustration  of  the  way  in  which  constitutional  restric- 
tions relating  to  uniformity  in  municipal  legislation  may  be 
evaded,  the  situation  since  that  date  shows  with  equal 
clearness  the  absurdity  of  such  restrictions  when  strictly 
enforced.  The  new  Ohio  code  applies  its  provisions  uni- 
formly to  seventy-two  cities  with  populations  ranging  from 
about  5000  to  over  a  half-million.  This  means  that  all  the 
cities,  whatever  their  varying  problems  and  needs,  must 
conform  themselves  to  a  rigid  framework  of  government 
which  makes  no  allowance  for  differences  in  local  condi- 
tions. Constitutional  limitations  that  require  such  in- 
elasticity cannot  but  overreach  themselves.  Must  a  small 

CLASS  II 

Grade  1,  from  30,500  to  31,500  (Columbus). 
Grade  2,  from  20,000  to  30,500  (Dayton). 
Grade  3,  from  10,000  to  20,000  (Youngstown). 
Grade  3a,  from  28,000  to  33,000  (Springfield). 
Grade  3b,  from  16,000  to  28,000  (Hamilton). 
Grade  4,  from  5000  to  10,000  (four  cities). 
Grade  4a,  from  8330  to  9050  (Ashtabula). 

1  State  v.  Jones,  66  Ohio,  453. 

2  An  excellent  summary  of  this  code,  with  a  narrative  of  the  events 
leading  to  its  adoption,  is  given  in  J.  A.  Fairlie's  Essays  in  Municipal 
Administration  (New  York,  1908),  ch.  v.     The  code  itself  is  edited,  with 
good  introduction  and  notes,  by  Wade  H.  Ellis  (Cincinnati,  1909). 


THE   CITY  AND  THE  STATE  57 

inland  city  be  burdened  with  all  the  cumbrous  machinery 
of  a  great  commercial  metropolis,  as  the  only  means  of 
relief  from  legislative  meddling  with  the  affairs  of  single 
municipalities?  Or  must  the  metropolis  manage  to  get 
along  with  the  administrative  machinery  of  a  country 
town  ?  It  takes  no  extended  argument  to  prove  that  mu- 
nicipal problems  become  more  difficult  as  cities  grow  in  size, 
that  questions  relating  to  police  and  fire  protection,  to  the 
control  of  public  utilities,  the  supplying  of  water,  the  pro- 
vision of  modern  methods  of  sanitation  and  of  public  recrea- 
tion facilities,  and  to  the  whole  host  of  minor  metropolitan 
services,  all  contribute  to  make  the  necessary  administra- 
tive machinery  of  a  large  city  somewhat  elaborate.  Cer- 
tain broad  lines  of  organization  can  profitably  be  followed^ 
in  all  cities,  great  or  small ;  but  the  details  of  the  govern- 
ing mechanism  ought  to  be  adjusted  to  the  problems  with 
which  it  will  have  to  cope. 

As  a  result  of  the  rigid  application  of  the  Ohio  code  of  Some 
1902  to  all  cities  in  the  state,  some  of  the  larger  municipali- 
ties have  been  heavily  handicapped  in  their  efforts  to  deal 
with  local  problems.  The  city  of  Cleveland,  for  example, 
has  found  itself  unable  to  prevent  the  disfigurement  of  its 
own  streets  by  signs  and  billboards,  to  provide  public  lec- 
tures in  its  schools,  to  establish  rules  relating  to  the  isola- 
tion of  persons  afflicted  by  tuberculosis,  and  to  do  many 
other  things  which  its  council  has  sought  to  accomplish  by 
ordinances  since  1902,  —  and  all  because  no  general  powers 
covering  such  matters  had  been  conferred  upon  all  the  cities 
of  the  state  by  the  municipal  code.  Apart  altogether  from 
the  merits  or  the  defects  of  these  proposed  regulations,  it 
may  very  well  be  urged  that  a  system  which  prevents  a  city 
from  providing  for  its  own  citizens  any  service  not  also 
provided  by  all  its  neighbors  is  supported  neither  by  common 
sense  nor  by  considerations  of  civic  progress.  Something 


58 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Constitu- 
tional 
classifica- 
tion of 
cities. 


may  be  said  in  favor  of  statutes  that  apply  uniformly  to  all 
cities  of  about  the  same  size,  but  it  does  not  follow  that  two 
cities  with  equal  populations  will  have  the  same  problems 
to  face.  The  texture  as  well  as  the  size  of  the  population  must 
be  taken  into  account.  Such  sweeping  reductions  of  all 
cities  to  the  same  plane  as  that  made  by  the  Ohio  code  is 
therefore  quite  at  variance  with  both  reason  and  experience.1 

Recognizing  the  undesirability  of  too  strict  a  rule,  and  at 
the  same  time  realizing  how  a  legislature  will  abuse  its 
powers  if  left  free  to  classify  cities  as  it  thinks  fit,  some  other 
states  have  endeavored  to  steer  a  midway  course  by  incor- 
porating in  the  constitution  itself  the  classification  of 
municipalities  that  seems  to  be  warranted  by  the  existing 
circumstances.  Such  constitutions  divide  cities  into  three 
or  four  groups,  usually  on  a  basis  of  the  population,  and 
require  that  statutes  passed  by  the  legislature  covering 
matters  of  municipal  government  shall  apply  to  all  the  cities 
within  at  least  one  of  these  groups.  This  is  in  many  ways 
an  improvement  upon  the  crude  plan  of  prohibiting  all 
special  legislation,  and  at  the  same  time  it  has  many  advan- 
tages over  the  practice  of  permitting  the  legislature  to 
exercise  an  unfettered  hand  in  the  way  of  special  law-making. 
The  chief  objection  is  that  such  classifications  are  artificial. 
taking  little  account  of  real  differences  between  cities  of 
approximately  the  same  sizef  and  as  a  rule  making  no 
provision  for  the  passage  of  a  city  from  one  class  to  another. 

A  somewhat  unusual  and  original  method  of  dealing 
with  the  matter  was  some  years  ago  put  into  operation  in 
New  York  State.  Although  the  policy  of  classifying  cities 

1The  Ohio  Constitutional  Convention  of  1912  incorporated  in  its  draft 
of  some  new  constitutional  limitations  a  series  of  municipal  home-rule 
provisions  giving  municipalities  power  either  to  frame  their  own  charters 
or  to  adopt  by  local  referendum  any  general  or  special  charter  law  which 
the  state  legislature  may  pass.  The  new  provisions  have  been  adopted 
by  the  voters  of  the  state  and  will  go  into  effect  on  January  1,  1913. 


THE   CITY  AND  THE   STATE  59 

according  to  their  size,  and  of  requiring  uniformity  of 
legislative  action  with  respect  to  all  municipalities  within 
each  class,  is  there  regarded  as  a  good  plan  for  ordinary 
use,  yet  it  is  recognized  that  there  may  be  good  reasons 
for  permitting  departures  from  it,  and  that  such  depar- 
tures, in  the  form  of  special  legislation  for  individual 
cities,  ought  to  be  allowed  under  proper  safeguards.  The 
best  safeguard,  as  it  appeared  to  those  who  framed  the  New 
York  constitution,  is  the  necessity  of  consulting  the  au- 
thorities of  the  city  affected  by  the  special  statute.  Hence 
the  constitution  groups  the  cities  of  the  state  into  three, 
classes,  and  permits  the  legislature  to  pass  any  law  apply- 
ing to  all  the  cities  in  any  one  of  the  three  classes  without 
consulting  the  authorities  of  such  cities.,1  Legislation 
applying  to  a  single  city  may  also  be  enacted,  but  in  such 
cases  the  city  concerned  mu^t  be  consulted.  When  any 
measure  applying  to  a  single  city  (or  to  less  than  the  whole 
number  of  cities  in  a  class)  has  passed  both  branches  of  the 
legislature,  it  must  be  sent  to  the  mayor  of  that  city,  who 
must  return  it  within  fifteen  days  with  a  declaration  that 
it  is  or  is  not  acceptable  to  the  city  authorities.  If  it  is 
acceptable,  it  goes  forward  to  the  governor  for  his  considera- 
tion, as  in  the  case  of  other  bills ;  if  it  is  not  acceptable,  it 
must  be  passed  again  by  the  legislature  before  it  can  be  sent 
to  him  for  approval.  In  actual  practice,  however  7  the  New 
York  plan  has  not  proved  very  effective  in  safeguarding 
the  cities  from  special  legislation.  A  somewhat  different 
plan  was  provided  in  an  amendment  made  to  the  constitu- 
tion of  Illinois  eight  years  ago  (1904).  This  provision  placed 
a  check  upon  the  right  of  the  state  legislature  to  pass  special 
acts  for  the  government  of  Chicago,  by  prescribing  that  jia 
such  special  act  should  go  into  operation  until  after  its  adop- 
tion by  the  voters  of  Chicago  at  a  referendum  election. 

1  Art.  xii.  §  2. 


60  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

Under  this  arrangement  it  has  been  found  that  while, 
Chicago  does  not  always  e^et  what  its  people  want  in  the 
way  of  legislation  they  can  at  any  rate  repel  attempts  to  force 
obnoxious  measurpg  nprm  t.V>Ptfv  All  this  was  very  well 
shown  in  1907  when  the  city  failed  in  its  efforts  to  get  a 
new  charter  satisfactory  to  its  own  people  but  at  the  same 
time  kept  the  legislature  from  imposing  upon  the  city  charter 
provisions  which  the  voters  did  not  want.  It  is  significant 
that  the  new  constitution  of  Michigan  includes  provisions 
for  local  referenda  on  special  legislation  relating  to  any  city 
of  that  state. 

Yet,  in  spite  of  all  these  constitutional  limitations,  the 
state  legislatures  have  a  broad  sphere  of  action  in  relation 
to  municipal  affairs,  and  they  have  used  their  powers  un- 
sparingly. In  the  larger  cities,  legislative  interference  with 
the  organization  and  functions  of  municipal  administration 
has  been  so  unremitting  as  frequently  to  constitute  an 
obstacle  to  the  development  of  any  sound  local  traditions. 
In  many  cases,  however,  the  arm  of  the  legislature  has 
been  put  forth  in  local  affairs  to  good  purpose  and  with 
excellent  reason;  for  uncontrolled  local  administration  is 
liable  to  become  slovenly  and  evftn  corrupt.  When,  for 
example,  the  police  administration  of  a  large  city  has  come 
to  be  hopelessly  honeycombed  with  the  by-products  of 
local  politics,  so  that  the  laws  of  the  state  stand  disre- 
garded, it  is  idle  to  urge  that  legislative  interposition  in 
the  interest  of  law  and  order  must  be  forever  forestalled  by 
some  dogma  of  political  laissez-faire.  Legislatures  have 
interfered  in  such  cases,  and  they  ought  to  do  so  whenever 
the  situation  warrants.  So,  also,  in  their  efforts  to  deliver 
cities  from  the  bondage  of  spoilsmen  through  the  applica- 
tion of  civil-service  laws,  and  in  establishing  safeguards 
against  the  improvidence  of  municipal  authorities,  the 
legislatures  have  acted  quite  defensibly,  even  if  sometimes 


THE   CITY  AND  THE  STATE  61 

in  a  partisan  spirit  as  well  as  in  violation  of  local  sentiment 
concerning  the  natural  rights  of  autonomous  municipalities. 

But  not  all  legislative  interference  in  the  affairs  of  cities  Motives  of 
has  been  prompted  by  any  such  proper  motives;  much  i^iatioo. 
of  it,  on  the  contrary,  has  been  actuated  by  an  ill-concealed 
desire  to  serve  purely  partisan  or  personal  ends.  To  help 
the  dominant  political  party,  or  to  gain  the  favor  of  public- 
service  corporations,  state  legislatures  have  times  without 
number  betrayed  the  best  interests  of  the  larger  cities  and 
set  the  will  of  the  citizens  at  naught.  Not  a  session  passes 
but  the  legislatures  of  Massachusetts,  New  York,  and  Penn- 
sylvania deliver  their  gjist  of  special  enactments  for  the 
benefit  of  Boston,  New  York  City,  and  Philadelphia.  It 
would  be  nonsense  to  assert  that  their  prolific  output  of 
special  legislation  is  needed  or  desired  by  these  cities,  or  that 
it  would  ever  be  forthcoming  if  the  cities  themselves  had 
power  to  order  it  otherwise.  From  1885  to  1908  the  Mas- 
sachusetts legislature  passed  no  fewer  than  four  hundred 
special  laws  relating  to  Boston,  with  the  result  that  a  volume 
containing  the  revised  state  statutes  affecting  a  single  city 
filled  more  than  six  hundred  closely-printed  pages.1  Many 
of  these  special  acts,  if  not  most  of  them,  embodied  ill-con- 
sidered, unnecessary,  and  primarily  partisan  legislative  action. 
Yet  the  legislature  of  Massachusetts  does  its  work  carefully, 
and  professes  to  have  as  much  respect  for  the  rights  of  the 
municipality  as  have  the  legislatures  of  most  other  states  of 
the  Union. 

Of  the  various  methods  of  protecting  cities  against  over-  Thehome- 
meddlesome  legislatures  the  most  effective  is  that  knpwn  Bystem. 


as  the  "home-rule  charter"  system.  This  plan  appears  to 
have  had  its  origin  in  the  Missouri  constitution  of  1875, 
which  gave  cities  of  over  100,000  population  the  right  to 

1  Statutes  relating  to  the  City  of  Boston  (ed.  T.  M.  Babson,  Boston, 
1908). 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


frame  and  enact  their  own  charters.1  By  the  provisions  of 
the  constitution  the  voters  of  the  city  might  elect  a  charter 
board  of  thirteen  members,  —  in  other  words,  a  miniature 
constitutional  convention,  —  which  was  empowered  either  to 
frame  a  new  city  charter  or  to  revise  an  old  one,  its  work 
when  finished  to  be  submitted  to  the  qualified  voters  at  a 
regular  election.  During  the  first  quarter-century  follow- 
ing its  adoption  this  system  gained  little  headway  outside 
the  state  in  which  it  originated;  in  1900  it  had  spread  to 
three  other  states  only.2  Within  the  next  ten  years,  how- 
ever, five  more  states  incorporated  in  their  constitutions 
the  principle  of  the  Missouri  plan,  and  most  of  them  made 
it  applicable  to  smaller  as  well  as  to  larger  cities.3 
How  home-  Among  these  nine  "home-rule  charter"  states  there  are 
considerable  differences  in  the  process  and  the  machinery 
of  charter-making.  In  some  of  them  the  initial  step  in 
the  adoption  or  the  revision  of  a  municipal  frame  of  govern- 
ment may  be  taken  on  petition  of  a  prescribed  number  of 
voters;4  in  others  the  city  council  must  make  the  first 
move ;  and  in  one  state,  Minnesota,  the  initiative  must  be 
taken  by  the  district  court.5  In  all  cases  (except  in  Minne- 
sota) the  actual  work  of  drafting  a  home-rule  charter  is 
intrusted  to  a  commission  commonly  called  a  board  of  free- 
holders, made  up  of  from  thirteen  to  twenty-one  members 
chosen  by  popular  vote,  usually  at  large,  but  in  some  cases 


. »  Art.  ix.  §§  16-17. 

*  Constitution  of  California,  1879,  art.  xi.  §§  6-8 ;  constitution  of 
Washington,  1889,  art.  xi.  §  10;  constitution  of  Minnesota,  art.  iv.  §  36 
(adopted  in  1898).  For  the  general  history  of  the  movement  during  this 
period,  see  M.  R.  Maltbie's  paper  on  "City-made  Charters,"  in  Yale 
Review,  XIII.  380-407  (February,  1905). 

1  Colorado  in  1902,  Oregon  in  1906,  Oklahoma  in  1907,  Michigan  in 
1908,  and  Arizona  in  1910. 

4  The  percentage  varies  from  5  per  cent  in  Colorado  to  25  per  cent  in 
Washington. 

6  Constitution  of  Minnesota,  art.  iv.  §  36. 


THE   CITY  AND  THE   STATE  63 

by  wards ;  and  jn  all  cases  the  document,  when  finished,  is. 
submitted  by  referendum  to  the  qualified  voters  of  the  citv. 
If  more  votes  are  cast  for  it  than  against  it,  the  charter 
usually  goes  into  effect ;  but  in  some  states  more  than  this 
is  required.  In  Minnesota  the  charter  commission  is  ap- 
pointed by  the  district  court  and  an  affirmative  popular  vote 
of  at  least  four-sevenths  is  demanded;  in  Michigan  the 
freeholders'  charter  goes  first  to  the  governor  and  if  he  dis- 
approves it  a  two-thirds  vote  at  the  local  referendum  is 
necessary  to  put  it  into  force ;  in  California  the  charter  does 
not  become  effective  until  the  legislature  has  also  approved 
it ; l  and  in  Oklahoma  it  has  to  be  submitted  to  the  governor 
of  the  state,  who  is,  however,  required  by  the  constitution 
to  sign  it  unless  it  appears  to  be  in  conflict  with  the  general 
statutes  of  the  state.  Amendments  to  a  home-rule  charter 
may  usually  be  initiated  and  ratified  in  the  same  way.2 

The  chief  objection  urged  against  the  system  of  home-  Objections 
rule  charters  is  that  it  gives  the  voters  of  individual  munici-  By8tem. 
palities  unwarranted  freedom  in  determining  things  which 
may  be  of  paramount  interest  to  themselves,  but  which 
are  also  of  great  concern  to  the  state  as  a  whole.  In  other 
words,  it  is  urged  that  there  can  be  no  clear  line  of  demar- 
cation between  functions  and  responsibilities  which  are 
strictly  municipal  and  those  which  appertain  to  the  state. 
Since,  for  example,  state  and  municipal  elections  are  often 
held  on  the  same  day,  with  the  same  ballots,  the  same 
officers  in  charge  of  the  polls,  and  the  same  securities 
for  fairness,  it  may  well  be  questioned  whether  the  state 
may  safely  permit  each  municipality  to  be  a  law  unto  itself 

1  The  legislature  mustJiQwever.  approve  or  reject  the  charter  as  a 
whole ;  it  can  make  no  amendments. 

2  Details  of  the  methods  in  vogue  in  the  various  states  may  be  found 
in  Comparative  Legislation  Bulletin,  No.  18  (on  "Municipal  Home  Rule 
Charters"),  issued  by  the  Wisconsin  Library  Commission,  Legislative 
Reference  Department,  Madison,  1908. 


64 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Limitations 
upon  the 
system : 


in  matters  relating  to  elections.  So  also  with  reference  to 
police  administration.  The  city's  policemen  are  appointed 
by  the  municipal  authorities,  and  are  paid  by  them ;  but 
the  chief  function  of  the  police  is,  after  all,  the  enforcement 
of  state  laws,  and  in  most  states  the  courts  have  upheld 
the  doctrine  that  they  are  state  officers.  Ought,  then,  the 
principle  of  local  autonomy  to  be  unrestricted  in  matters 
relating  to  the  appointment,  organization,  discipline,  and 
functions  of  municipal  police  ?  So,  again,  if  one  considers 
such  matters  as  the  organization  of  municipal  courts  and 
the  administration  of  local  justice,  the  system  of  compul- 
sory elementary  education,  the  assessment  of  taxes,  and  the 
exercise  of  borrowing  powers,  one  finds  that  the  line  of 
cleavage  between  matters  of  municipal  and  state  jurisdic- 
tion is  not  so  easily  drawn  as  some  advocates  of  the  home- 
rule  charter  system  seem  to  imagine.  A  recognition  of  this 
fact  has  forced  the  courts  in  home-rule  charter  states  to. 
decide  that  municipal  charter  provisions  cannot  supersede 
the  general  state  laws  relating  to  police  administration, 
election  machinery,  the  administration  of  justice,  the  school 
system  or  in  any  matter  which  is  of  more  than  purely  local 
concern ;  and  the  upshot  of  this  ruling  is  to  throw  upon  the 
courts  rather  than  upon  the  legislature  the  determination  of 
the  question  as  to  how  far  municipal  autonomy  may  be  in- 
fringed in  the  general  interest.1 

At  best,  there  must  be  some  important  limitations  upon 
the  freedom  of  cities  to  deal  in  their  own  way  with  what 
seem  to  be  their  own  local  affairs.  Just  what  these  limita- 
tions ought  to  be  and  how  far  they  should  extend  is  some- 
thing upon  which  few  men  will  agree;  but  in  general  the 
following  propositions  will  not  be  subject  to  very  serious 
dispute.  In  the  first  place,  the  exercise  by  cities  of  the 


1  See  the  list  of  cases  cited  in  Eugene  McQuillin's  Law  of  Municipal 
Corporations  (6  vols.,  Chicago,  1911-1912),  I.  309. 


THE   CITY  AND  THE   STATE  65 

power  of  taxation  ought  to  be  closely  guarded  in  the  general  (?)  tar*, 
laws.  Taxation  is  essentially  a  sovereign  function;  it 
gives  to  authorities  a  weapon  which  may  very  readily  be 
misused ;  hence  uncontrolled  liberty  to  impose  taxes  might 
enable  the  cities  to  put  grave  difficulties  in  the  way  of  general 
state  administration.  The  power  to  tax  is  the  power  to 
destroy;  it  is  therefore  not  a  function  which  the  state 
should  delegate  without  reservation  to  any  subordinate 
authority. 

So,  too,  with  regard  to  the  police  power,  which  in  its  (6)  police ; 
broader  sense  is  always  committed  by  the  constitution  to  the 
state  legislature.  Since  the  preservation  of  the  public  health 
safety,  and  morals  ought  to  be  the  first  care  of  the  state, 
the  police  power  should  never  be  surrendered  to  any  sub- 
sidiary corporate  authority.  Again,  when  the  same  voting-  (c)  election 
lists  are  used  in  state  and  local  elections,  or  when  pollings 
are  held  on  the  same  day  and  in  the  same  places,  it  seems 
best  that  the  hand  of  the  state  should  be  unrestrained  by 
local  regulations.  Many  considerations  make  it  desirable,  too, 
that  the  qualifications  for  voting,  the  methods  of  compiling 
the  lists,  the  machinery  of  the  poll,  the  securities  against 
unfair  practices,  and  the  provisions  affecting  recounts 
should  be  uniform  throughout  the  state.  They  cannot  .be 
uniform  if  each  city  is  allowed  to  make  its  own  rules  in 
such  matters.  Or  take  the  field  of  municipal  expenditures 
and  indebtedness.  Here  again  there  is  much  to  be  said  for 
statutory  regulations  which  require  city  councils  to  make 
their  appropriations  in  a  business-like  manner,  which  pro- 
vide proper  safeguards  against  payment  of  public  monies 
without  due  warrant,  which  require  municipal  treasurers 
to  make  their  annual  reports  in  a  uniform  way,  and  which  au- 
thorize some  state  official  to  see  that  these  rules  are  honored 
in  the  observance. 

Likewise,  the  right  to  borrow  money  without  interference 


66 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


(d)  borrow- 
ing ; 


(e)  educa- 
tion and 
philan- 
thropy. 


Additional 

restrictions 
in  metro- 
politan 
areas. 


is  not  a  power  that  can  safely  be  granted  to  cities.  It  is 
plausible  to  urge  that  taxpayers  should  be  permitted  to  do 
as  they  will  with  their  own  financial  credit  ;  but  the  right  of 
a  city  to  borrow  its  way  into  bankruptcy  does  not  appear 
to  be  self-evident.  Whether  restrictions  upon  municipal 
borrowing  should  take  the  form  of  a  general  statutory  debt 
limit,  as  in  New  York  and  Massachusetts,  or  whether  each 
proposal  to  borrow  should  be  dealt  with  on  its  individual 
merits  by  a  state  authority,  is  an  open  question,  with  the 
lessons  of  history  pointing  mainly  toward  the  latter  method  ; 
but  that  there  should  be  reasonable  state  restriction  or  super- 
vision of  some  kind  is  scarcely  to  be  gainsaid.  Finally,  edu- 
cation and  charity  can  hardly  be  accounted  purely  local 
function^.  Uniformity  of  organization  and  method  in  both 
these  fields  of  civic  effort,  though  by  no  means  imperative, 
seems  to  be  desirable  ;  otherwise  there  is  liable  to  be  an  over- 
lapping of  undertakings,  attended  by  wastefulness  and  the 
penalizing  of  one  municipality  for  the  sins  of  another. 
When  several  cities  are  contiguous  or  ev^n  in  th 


general  sphere  of  communication  there  are  additional 
grounds  for  state  interference  with  local  freedom.  Freedom 
here  means  independence  of  action,  which  is  another  way 
of  saying  that  public  services  will  be  so  uncoordinated  as  to 
be  detrimental  to  the  best  interests  of  the  whole  district. 
Take  the  Boston  metropolitan  district  as  an  example. 
Within  fifteen  miles  of  Beacon  Hill  there  are  no  fewer  than 
thirty-nine  cities  and  towns,  each  with  its  own  municipal 
organization.  To  allow  all  these  municipalities  entire 
freedom  of  action  in  the  matter  of  making  arrangements 
with  public-utility  corporations  would  be  to  inaugurate 
a  regime  of  franchise  chaos.  No  public-service  corporation 
could  give  much  satisfaction  were  it  required  to  deal  with 
thirty-nine  separate  authorities.  A  somewhat  analogous 
situation  exists  in  and  around  Chicago  where  the  Illinois 


THE   CITY  AND  THE   STATE  67 

Traction  Company  operates  the  street  railways  and  the 
electric  lighting  plants  throughout  a  wide  area  comprising 
many  cities.  In  such  casesf  therefore,  the  state  legislature 
may,  in  the  absence  of  any  general  metropolitan  authority, 
very  properly  reserve  to  itself  the  final  decision  in  matters 
affec|,jng._  public-service  franchises^  Limitations  on  munic- 
ipal autonomy  may,  indeed,  go  further  in  such  instances. 
When  there  is  a  common  interest,  as  there  may  be  in  a 
scheme  of  district  water-supply,  sewerage,  parks,  or  general 
planning,  there  should  be  common  control ;  and,  if  the  munic- 
ipalities concerned  are  not  willing  to  be  federated  into  a 
single  unit,  state  supervision  of  all  projects  affecting  several 
cities  seems  to  be  about  the  only  practicable  avenue  of 
progress.  The  principle  of  permitting  cities  to  do  things  in 
their  own  way,  as  the  home-rule  charter  plan  proposes,  must, 
therefore  be  subject  to  important  limitations. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  are  some  sound  and  cogent  Advantages 
reasons  for  the  extension  of  the  plan.     One  of  these  lies  in  the  hom^-ruie 
increasing  difficulty  with  which  legislatures   find   time   to  charter 

^B-——BiB««»«-ii™i—i«»*L»M——_—.M-i— "-«•*"-•'—"  '       system. 

consider  adequately  requests  that  come  forward  at  each 
session  either  for  new  charters  or  for  amendments  to  existing 
ones.  In  Massachusetts,  at  the  legislative  session  of  1911, 
petitions  for  new  charters  came  from  ten  cities,  some  of 
which  sent  not  merely  one  fully-framed  proposal  ready  for 
enactment  into  law,  but  two  or  three  of  them.  A  dozen 
other  cities  asked  for  one  or  more  charter  amendments. 
Of  proposals  to  amend  the  charter  of  Boston  the  legislature 
found  itself  confronted  with  at  least  a  score ; 1  and  it  is  within 
bounds  to  say  that  at  this  single  session  there  were  presented 
to  it  at  least  one  hundred  measures,  each  of  which  would, 
if  adopted,  have  been,  in  effect  at  least,  an  amendment  to 

1  At  the  legislative  session  of  1912  no  fewer  than  68  bills  were  sent 
to  the  legislature  by  the  mayor  of  Boston  alone.  Of  this  number  less 
than  a  dozen  were  enacted  into  law. 


68 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Inadequacy 
of  considera- 
tion given 
to  charters 
by  legisla- 
tures. 


Inherent 
defects  of 
legislative 
charter- 
making. 


the  charter  of  some  city  of  the  commonwealth.1  To  allege 
that  these  measures  received,  or  could  receive,  much  more 
than  a  hasty  survey  from  a  body  of  nearly  three  hundred 
legislators  would  be  to  attribute  to  the  law-makers  of  Massa- 
chusetts the  power  to  achieve  a  physical  impossibility. 
Moreover,  according  to  the  report  of  a  commission  appointed 
a  few  years  ago  by  the  governor  of  West  Virginia  to  examine 
this  situation,  the  host  of  charter  matters  which  come  before 
the  legislature  at  every  session  not  oniy  fail  to  obtain  ade- 
quate study  and  discussion  for  themselves,  but  they  seriously 
impede  the  consideration  and  passage  of  important  legisla- 
tion affecting  the  people  of  the  state  as  a  whole.  Testimony 
to  the  seriousness  of  this  impediment  can  be  adduced  from 
the  legislative  journals  of  almost  every  state  where  the 
special-charter  system  prevails ;  and  the  situation  does  not 
seem  to  be  much  better  in  states  where  legislation  for  cities 
is  by  general  law,  since  scores  of  general  amendments  come 
forward  at  every  session.  Upon  a  conservative  estimate, 
fully  one-third  of  the  entire  time  of  the  Ohio  legislature  has 
been  occupied  in  recent  years  with  local  measures  proposed 
in  general  form.  As  cities  continue  to  increase  in  number, 
extent,  and  importance,  this  burden  upon  the  time  and 
patience  of  legislatures  will  increase  rather  than  relax.__ 
If  it  is  not  yet  intolerable,  it  is  likely  to  become  so. 

Not  only  does  the  system  of  home-rule  charters  promise 
that  most  of  the  legislation  affecting  cities  shall  have  due 
discussion  and  consideration  without  impeding  the  progress 
of  more  general  measures,  but  it  gives  some  assurance  that 
this  legislation  will  be  dealt  with  upon  their  merits  by  men 
who  are  in  position  to  know  most  about  these  merits  and 

1  The  legislative  Committee  on  Cities  considered  85  bills ;  and  75 
others  went  to  the  Committee  on  Metropolitan  Affairs,  not  to  mention 
dozens  of  measures  relating  directly  to  city  administration  which  went 
to  standing  committees  on  Street  Railways,  Water-supply,  Taxation,  Public 
Lighting,  Liquor  Laws,  Public  Health,  Election  Laws,  and  Education. 


THE   CITY  AND   THE   STATE  69 


who  are  most  immediately  p.nnnfirned  with  them.  Under 
the  conditions  that  now  prevail  in  most  states  this  is  not 
the  case.  Measures  affecting  the  framework  or  the  functions 
of  city  administration  are  too  often  rejected  or  approved 
on  grounds  entirely  foreign  to  their  merits  ;  the  controlling 
factor  is  more  likely  to  be  the  attitude  of  this  or  that  political 
faction  or  the  interest  of  this  or  that  public-service  corpora- 
tion. Furthermore,  senators  and  representatives  from  rural 
districts  influence  and  often  control  the  action  of  the 
legislature  in  matters  of  metropolitan  policy,  when  they 
have  neither  the  requisite  local  knowledge  nor  the  interest 
to  make  their  influence  salutary.  Thus  it  has  come  to  pass 
that  New  York  City  must  make  its  supplication  for  charter 
amendments  to  honorable  gentlemen  from  Chenango  and 
Chemung,  while  the  metropolitan  problems  of  Boston 
must  look  for  their  solution  to  statesmen  from  Chicopee 
and  Cape  Cod.  Accordingly,  legislation  affecting  large 
cities,  being  handled  by  men  who  are  qualified  neither  by 
temperament  nor  by  training  to  deal  with  it  upon  its  merits, 
must  usually  depend  for  its  acceptance  or  its  rejection  upon 
those  political  or  corporate  influences  which  can  determine 
the  attitude  of  the  "up-state  representative,"  —  in  other 
words,  upon  the  relative  skill  in  the  arts  of  legislative  ma- 
nipulation mustered  by  its  friends  and  its  opponents.  The 
case  for  municipal  home-rule  therefore  finds  its  strongest 
argument  in  the  conditions  which  exist  wherever  this 
principle  of  local  government  is  disregarded.  The  statute- 
books  abound  with  instances  of  enactments  imposed  upon 
cities  despite  their  reasonable  protests  and  contrary  to 
their  best  interests,  legislation  which,  if  it  had  been  submitted 
to  the  citizens,  would  never  have  received  the  indorsement 
of  a  tithe  of  the  voters.  The  state  gives,  and  the  state 
takes  away  ;  but  seldom  do  the  citizens  regard  its  handiwork 
as  a  blessing. 


70 


GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 


General 
charter 
laws  and 
home-rule 
charters. 


Educative 
influence 
of  the 
home-rule 
system. 


To  the  special-charter  system,  with  its  heavy  burden 
upon  the  time  and  the  temper  of  legislatures  and  its  premium 
on  lobbying  and  log-rolling,  there  are  but  two  alternatives. 
One  of  these  is  the  enactment  of  a  general  charter  law  for 
all  the  cities  of  the  state,  or  of  a  series  of  general  charter 
laws  each  applying  to  cities  of  a  certain  class.  This  system, 
however,  though  it  may  mitigate  some  of  the  evils  connected 
with  special  legislation,  does  not,  as  we  have  seen,  eliminate 
them  altogether.  The  results  in  Ohio  and  in  other  states 
which  have  had  experience  with  the  general-chartersystem 
are  not  such  as  to  warrant  any  enthusiastic  advocacy  of 
the  plan.  The  other  alternative  is  the  adoption  of  the 
principle  of  local  autonomy,  subject  to  such  reservations 
as  the  state  may  properly  make  in  the  interest  of  its  own 
administrative  efficiency.  In  operation  this  principle  has 
demonstrated  its  popularity;  it  has  proved  a  tolerably 
effective  safeguard  against  pernicious  legislative  interference 
in  matters  of  purely  local  import,  and  it  has  not  been  abused 
by  those  cities  which  have  enjoyed  great  freedom  of  action 
under  it. 

Something  may  also  be  said  for  the  home-rule  charter 
system  as  an  agency  of  political  education.  In  a  city  that 
has  been  permitted  to  frame  its  own  charter,  the  electorate  is 
likely  to  take  a  keener  interest  in  all  matters  affecting  the 
organic  laws  of  the  municipality  than  in  one  in  which  the 
people  are  merely  allowed  to  pass  upon  what  the  legislature 
presents  to  them.  One  way  to  excite  popular  interest  in 
any  subject  is  to  create  popular  responsibility.  In  states 
like  California  and  Missouri,  the  campaign  that  precedes 
the  election  of  a  freeholders'  convention  to  draft  a  charter, 
the  public  hearings,  the  convention  discussions,  and  the 
large  attention  which  the  press  is  sure  to  give  to  mooted 
questions,  all  combine  to  arouse  interest  in  the  fundamental 
questions  of  local-government  organization. 


THE  CITY  AND  THE  STATE  71 

It  has  also  been  argued,  and  with  some  color  of  plausi-  its  influence 
bility,  that  the  home-rule  charter  system  does  its  share  in 
helping  to  divorce  state  and  municipal  politics.  There 
can  be  no  doubt  that  the  policy  of  permitting  the  state 
legislature  to  make,  unmake,  and  amend  city  charters  at  its 
own  pleasure  and  caprice  has  contributed  to  the  confusion 
of  state  and  local  issues.  So  long  as  the  charter  of  a  citv 
remains  wholly  within  the  range  of  legislative  jurisdiction. 
it  is  obviously  not  easy  to  keep  state  and  municipal  issues 
apart,  or  to  regard  the  city  as  haying  a  right  to  a  sphere 
of  independence  in  politics.  Only  by  giving  the  city  such 
independence,  it  is  asserted,  can  state  politicians  be  compelled 
to  keep  their  activities  outside  the  city's  gates.  Although 
the  home-rule  charter  system  does  not  give  complete 
autonomy  to  the  municipality,  it  at  least  elevates  it  into 
a  position  in  which  its  charter  provisions  can  no  longer 
be  made  the  plaything  of  state  political  rivalries.  Tak- 
ing all  these  things  into  account,  therefore,  the  home-rule 
charter  system  has  much  to  commend  it,  despite  its  serious 
limitations  and  its  incidental  defects.  Its  extension  to 
other  states  may  be  looked  for  within  the  next  few  years. 

Save  in  so  far  as  it  has  been  put  in  leash  by  the  provisions  The 
of  the  federal  or  the  state  constitution,  the   power  of  the  ofltate 
legislature  over  the  city  is  supreme.     The  American  city  has.  interference- 
no  inherent  authority  ;  its  charter  is  ^  g^-ant  of 


powers  :  ji  is  the  creature  of  the  state.  Naturally,  then, 
since  constitutional  limitations  have  in  most  states  been 
relatively  few,  interference  has  been  unremitting.  This 
interposition  in  municipal  administration  has  taken  the 
form  either  of  legislative  or  of  administrative  control,  usually 
the  former.  State  laws  stipulate  in  no  uncertain  terms 
what  cities  must  or  must  not  do.  They  frequently  set 
limits  to  the  taxing  powers  of  city  authorities;  and  they 
fix  bounds  beyond  which  cities  may  not  incur  indebtedness, 


72  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

naming  these  boundaries,  as  a  rule,  in  terms  of  a  percentage 
of  the  city's  assessed  valuation.  State  laws  determine  the 
scope  of  the  city's  licensing  power,  fix  the  license  fees,  and 
regulate  the  hours  during  which  liquor  may  be  sold.  They 
determine  the  period  for  which  the  city  may  grant  franchises 
in  its  own  streets,  they  make  mandatory  the  provision  of 
various  municipal  services,  and  they  determine  the  duties 
and  responsibilities  of  many  municipal  officers.  "To 
indicate  all  the  forms  which  legislative  control  has  taken 
in  the  United  States  would  be  to  enumerate  practically 
every  detail  of  city  government  from  the  general  structure 
of  the  city  organization  to  the  salaries  of  firemen  or  the  right 
of  the  city  to  alter  the  grade  or  the  width  of  a  street." *  The 
American  city  has,  in  fact,  ceased  to  be  what  it  once  was, 
an  organization  for  the  satisfaction  of  local  needs,  and  has 
become  a  cog  in  the  machinery  whereby  the  state  carries 
out  its  functions  of  government.  This  subordination  of 
the  city's  autonomy  to  what  is  conceived  to  be  the  interest 
of  the  whole  state  has  furnished  an  almost  limitless  oppor- 
tunity for  legislative  control.  State  legislatures  have  acquired 
the  habit,  which  has  in  some  cases  developed  into  a  vice, 
of  enacting  into  laws  all  manner  of  limitations  upon  munic- 
ipal independence,  and  this  wholly  upon  their  own  inspira- 
tion and  initiative,  not  only  without  the  advice  and  consent 
of  the  municipalities  concerned,  but  often  in  direct  contraven- 
tion of  their  interests  and  wishes. 

ineffective-  Legislative  control  of  city  affairs  is  above  all  things  ama- 
legisiative  teurish.  the  work  of  men  who  have  no  special  skill  or  apti- 
controiover  ^ude  jn  wnat  they  undertake  to  do,  and  who  often  have 

city  affairs. 

scant  knowledge  of  the  conditions  under  which  their  enact- 
ments are  to  be  applied.  Most  of  it  has,  in  consequence, 
been  worthless  or  worse^  Its  ineffectiveness  is  a  common- 
place among  municipal  officers,  and  nowhere  more  so 

1  A.  R.  Hatton,  Digest  of  City  Charters  (Chicago,  1906),  32. 


THE   CITY  AND  THE  STATE  73 

than  in  those  states  which  have  been  most  persistent  in 
their  disregard  of  the  claims  of  cities  to  deal  with  their  own 
affairs  in  their  own  way.  Massachusetts,  for  example,  has 
rigid  laws  circumscribing  the  powers  of  cities  to  tax  and 
to  borrow:  no  city  of  the  state  may  levy  above  the  pre- 
scribed tax  limit,  or  issue  bonds  beyond  the  allotted  debt 
limit.  These  limitations,  left  to  be  self-enforcing,  have, 
however,  been  evaded  by  all  manner  of  subterfuges ;  hardly 
a  city  in  the  commonwealth  has  conformed  to  them  either 
in  letter  or  in  spirit.  Money  is  borrowed  in  anticipation 
of  taxes ;  and  in  many  cases  these  loans  are  not  met  when 
the  taxes  come  in,  but  are  renewed,  frequently  for  year  after 
year,  by  the  issuance  of  new  notes  extending  or  taking  up 
their  predecessors.  An  investigating  accountant  recently 
found  $200,000  of  such  notes  in  one  city,  and  $160,000  in 
another.  "Similar  infractions  of  the  spirit  and  even  the 
letter  of  the  law,"  he  reported,  "are  common  in  the  cities 
and  towns  of  this  Commonwealth." l  The  tax  rate  is  held 
down  under  cover  of  debt  issues ;  and  the  limitations  upon 
bonded  indebtedness  are  evaded  either  by  the  maintenance 
of  floating  obligations  renewed  year  after  year,  or  by  the 
using  up  of  monies  supposed  to  be  held  in  sinking  funds. 
In  one  Massachusetts  city  the  sinking-fund  deficiency  was 
recently  found  to  exceed  $600,000. 

If  legislative  control  cannot  be  made  effective  when  it 
undertakes  to  compel  the  observance  of  a  few  simple  rules 
in  the  field  of  municipal  finance,  how  much  less  potent  is  its 
influence  likely  to  be  when  it  seeks  to  regulate  the  minutiae 
of  departmental  administration,  to  deal  with  the  details 
of  municipal  police,  sanitation,  or  poor  relief.  Foreign^ 
lands,  such  as  England,  Francef  and  Germanyr  having! 
long  since  recognized  the  futility  of  expecting  satisfactory 

1  H.  N.  Chase,  A  Report  to  His  Excellency  the  Governor  .  .  .  concern- 
ing .  .  .  Municipal  Debts  and  Revenue  (Boston,  1911),  7. 


74 


GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 


results  through  this  channel  of  local  supervision,  put  their 
trust  in  a  system  of  administrative  qont.fnT  In  England 
the  Local  Government  Board  and  the  Board  of  Trade  are 
examples  of  administrative  organs  through  which  the 
central  government  holds  the  local  authorities  in  check. 
In  France  the  prefect  is  the  ever-watchful  administrative 
agent  of  the  national  government.  In  America,  on  the 
contrary,  this  method  of  guarding  the  interest  of  the  gtat,^ 
in  city  affairs  has  been  used  to  a  relatively  slight  extent  | 
it  is  only  within  comparatively  recent  years.  indeedT  that  it^ 
has  been  used  at  alL  Its  development,  so  far  as  it  has  pro- 
ceeded, has  been  inspired  by  a  growing  belief  in  the  weakness 
and  uncertainty  of  control  by  statute,  particularly  in  such 
matters  as  excise  administration  and  the  conduct  of  elections. 
Develop-  Several  states  have  taken  over  into  the  hands  of  their  own 

adminLtra-  administrative  officials  the  enforcement  of  the  state  liquor 
laws>  *heir  acti°n  being  prompted  by  a  feeling  that  the  city 
authorities  cannot  be  depended  upon  to  perform  this  func- 
tion satisfactorily.  In  some  states  election  commissioners 
are  appointed  to  see  that  the  general  laws  governing  election 
procedure  are  carried  out.  In  New  York  and  Illinois  a  state 
civil-service  commission  supervises  the  work  of  the  civil- 
service  boards  maintained  by  the  cities,  and  holds  them  to 
a  strict  conformance  with  the  law.  In  Massachusetts  a 
state  civil-service  board  administers  the  law  directly,  without 
the  use  of  local  commissions  as  intermediaries.  In  New 
York,  Wisconsin,  and  other  states,  public-utilities  commis- 
sions adjust  the  relations  between  the  cities  and  the  public- 
service  corporations.  By  state  boards  of  health  and  boards 
of  education  many  states  have  increased  the  strictness  of 
their  administrative  control  over  the  corresponding  municipal 
activities.  In  at  least  a  few  states  the  statistical  and  account- 
ing departments  of  state  government  have  enforced  progress 
in  the  direction  of  uniform  municipal  book-keeping;  and 


United 


THE   CITY  AND   THE   STATE  75 

their  success  has  given  rise  to  a  movement  for  the  establish- 
ment of  state  finance  boards  that  will  secure  the  observance 
of  the  laws  relating  to  municipal  assessment,  taxation,  ex- 
penditure, and  borrowing.1 

In  addition  to  extending  administrative  control  to  all  Special 
their  cities  without  distinction,  some  states  have  developed, 
the  practice  of  applying  this  form  of  supervision  to  particu- 
lar  departments  of  individual  cities,  or  groups  of  cities,  such 
as  the  police  department,  nr  the  sanitary  department r 
Massachusetts,  Missouri,  and  Maryland  have  put  under 
the  direct  administrative  control  of  the  state  the  police  depart- 
ments of  Boston,  St.  Louis,  and  Baltimore,  on  the  theory 
that  the  whole  state  is  too  much  interested  in  the  police 
administration  of  the  metropolis  to  permit  it  to  be  left  in  local 
hands.  Massachusetts  has,  furthermore,  given  to  state  com- 
missions the  administration  of  the  main  sewerage,  water,  and 
park  systems  of  a  metropolitan  district  which  includes  Boston 
and  more  than  a  score  of  encircling  cities  and  towns,  on  the 
theory  that  in  the  absence  of  any  general  district  authority 
no  comprehensive  policy  in  these  important  services  can  be 
worked  out  by  the  free  action  of  many  independent  munic- 
ipal units.  Wherever  a  problem  of  public  service  transcends^ 
in  scope  the  boundaries  of  several  municipalities,  the  natural 
tendency  is  to  call  for  state  interposition.  When  these 
various  examples  are  considered  in  their  totality,  it  is  seen 
that  the  amount  of  administrative  control  already  developed 
by  American  states  is  larger,  perhaps,  than  is  usually  supposed. 
On  the  other  hand,  that  it  is  as  yet  crude  and  meagre  when 

1  The  course  of  this  development  has  been  dealt  with  in  detail  by  the 
writers  of  various  monographs  in  the  Columbia  University  Studies  in 
History,  Economics,  and  Public  Law :  R.  H.  Whitten,  Public  Adminis- 
tration in  Massachusetts,  the  Relation  of  Central  to  Local  Activity;  J.  A. 
Fairlie,  The  Centralization  of  Administration  in  New  York  State;  C.  M.  L. 
Sites,  Centralized  Administration  of  the  Liquor  Laws  in  American  Common- 
wealths; S.  P.  Orth,  The  Centralization  of  Administration  in  Ohio;  and 
W.  A.  Rawles,  Centralizing  Tendencies  in  the  Administration  of  Indiana. 


76 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


The  future 
relation 
of  city 
and  state. 


compared  with  the  well-ordered  administrative  arrangements 
by  which  the  various  European  countries  provide  central 
supervision  of  local  government,  is  just  as  evident.1  That  it 
should  be  much  less  comprehensive  than  the  systems  of 
France  and  Germany  is  no  cause  for  wonder  ;  but  that  the 
United  States  should  have  fallen  so  far  behind  England  in 
matters  of  local  supervision  through  administrative  agencies 
is  not  so  readily  explained.  It  is  to  be  remembered,  however, 
that  this  development  has  taken  place  in  England  within 
the  last  forty  years.  During  the  next  forty  a  similar  ad- 
vance may  be  made  in  America.  If  it  does,  it  will  be  a 
desirable  advance  ;  for  administrative  control  is  in  every 
way  preferable  to  that  factious  interference  with 


autonomy  which  we  nal]  legislative  supervision.  i  It  is  super- 
vision by  experts,  and  hence  is  based  upon  knowledge,  not 
upon  caprice  ;  it  is  consistent  in  policy  :  it  does  not  give 
unnecessary  affront  to  looaj  ^plf-rpspp^f.  ;  and  it  is  effective 


in  doing  what  it  sets  ou^  to  do.  The  substitution  of  adminis- 
trative for  legislative  supervision  —  that  is  to  say,  of  super- 
vision by  responsible  boards  of  trained  men  rather  than  by 
the  desultory  action  of  legislatures  —  would  be  an  influential 
factor  in  improving  the  relations  of  the  city  to  the  state, 
and  would  thereby  have  a  beneficial  reaction  upon  the  affairs 
of  the  city  itself.  A  sharp  distinction  ought  to  be  made, 
however,  between  state  administrative  supervision  and 
direct  state  control  of  municipal  activities.  The  latter, 
especially  when  the  city  is  forced  to  pay  the  bills,  is  never 
popular  and  cannot  be  looked  upon  as  affording  a  permanent 
solution  of  local  problems. 

The  city  charter,  whatever  the  procedure  under  which 
it  is  secured,  is  the  constitution  of  the  municipality.  As 
such,  it  ought  to  be  prepared  with  great  care  as  to  arrange- 


1  These  arrangements  are  set  forth  in  F.  J.  Goodnow's  Comparative 
Administrative  Law  (2  vols.,  New  York,  1903),  I.  ohs.  v-vii. 


THE   CITY  AND  THE  STATE  77 

ment,  matter,  and  phraseology.     So  far  as  arrangement  is 
concerned,  the  drafting  of  city  charters  has  in  general  left 
much  to  be  desired.     There  has  been  no  accepted  model 
to  follow;    every  charter  commission  or  legislative  com- 
mittee has  stumbled  along  upon  a  plan  of  its  own,  so  that 
the  method  of  arranging  matter  in  a  city  charter  has  rarely 
contributed  to  either  clearness  or  symmetry.     An  arrange-  General 
ment  into  chapters  and  sections  such  as  will  put  provisions  mentof 
of  the  same  sort  together  and  keep  provisions  relating  to  Provuuona- 
different  branches  of  the  city  government  separate  from 
one  another,  which  will  give  chapter  and  section  headings 
that   are   really  designatory   and  yet   mutually   exclusive, 
which  will  set  provisions  in  their  logical  order,  —  an    ar- 
rangement that  will  secure  these  ends  would  satisfy  any 
reasonable  requirement.1 

The  substance  of  the  provisions  will  of  course  depend  Need  of 

,,  ...  .    .  ,  •      i'  *     .1  preliminary 

upon  the  convictions,  opinions,  and  prejudices  of  those  8tudy. 
who  frame  the  charter.  Their  work  of  drafting  ought  to 
be  preceded  by  a  thorough  and  careful  study,  not  only  of 
provisions  in  the  charters  of  other  cities,  but  of  actual  con- 
ditions in  the  particular  municipality  with  which  they 
have  to  deal.  There  is  no  set  of  charter  provisions  that 
will  fit  readily  the  needs  of  all  cities,  or  even  of  cities  that 
superficially  appear  to  be  alike  in  their  requirements.  All 
this  ought  to  be  commonplace,  but  in  practice  it  is  almost 
everywhere  disregarded.  Charters  are  drafted  to  elabo- 

1  The  following  chapter  headings  may  be  suggested  as  indicating  a 
suitable  scheme  of  general  arrangement :  — 

1.  General  Provisions.  8.  The    Powers    and   Duties   of 

2.  Nominations  and  Elections.  Officers. 

3.  The  City  Council.  9.  Accounts  and  the  Conduct  of 

4.  The  Mayor.  Business. 

5.  Administrative  Departments.  10.  Direct  Legislation. 

6.  Income  and  Appropriations.  11.  Franchises. 

7.  Loans,  and  Appropriations  12.  Miscellaneous. 

therefrom. 


78  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

rate  this  or  that  set  of  principles,  and  frequently  by  men 
who  have  had  no  experience  in  municipal  affairs  whatever. 
More  often  than  not,  the  framers  fail  to  equip  themselves 
for  effective  work  by  any  study  of  the  city's  actual  prob- 
lems. It  would  be  far  better  for  our  cities  if  every 
charter-drafting  body  would  follow  the  example  of  the 
Boston  Finance  Commission,  and  devote  a  year  to  a  relent- 
less probe  of  every  branch  of  city  government  before  be- 
ginning its  constructive  work.  As  a  rule,  too  much  time 
and  energy  are  spent  in  framing  the  political  provisions  of 
a  charter,  the  sections  relating  to  the  methods  of  nomina- 
tion, the  machinery  of  election,  the  organization  of  the 
council,  and  the  general  powers  of  the  mayor.  Not  enough 
attention  is  bestowed  upon  the  administrative  and  the 
business  provisions,  those  which  deal  with  the  methods  of 
making  appropriations,  with  the  safeguards  against  ex- 
travagance, the  restriction  of  the  city's  borrowing  powers, 
the  system  of  municipal  accounting,  the  organization  of  the 
administrative  departments,  the  methods  of  selecting  sub- 
ordinate officers,  the  distribution  of  official  duties,  and  the 
relations  of  the  municipality  to  public-service  corporations. 
These  are  the  most  difficult  provisions  to  frame  properly; 
the  proper  consideration  of  them  requires  a  thorough  grasp 
of  local  conditions,  and  upon  the  amount  of  careful  atten- 
tion which  they  receive  the  successful  working  of  the  charter 
will  very  largely  depend. 

The  As  to   phraseology,   the  everyday  rules  that   ought  to 

of  cha-rters.  &&&  observance  in  the  framing  of  ordinary  statutes  need 
to  be  scrupulously  observed  in  the  drafting  of  corporate 
charters.  Tho  ipPQm'np-  /-.f  Q|  ^iwmVnp  is  f.nn  nff.pp  hidden 
in  a  mass  of  le^al  verbiage  which  seems  to  have  for  its_aim 
the  violation  of  every  rule  of  English  composition.  This 
is  because  charter-makers  usually  copy,  so  far  as  possible, 
the  phraseology  of  something  already  upon  the  statute- 


THE   CITY  AND   THE   STATE  79 

book,  which  has,  in  turn,  borrowed  the  language  of  some- 
thing that  went  before.  An  avoidance  of  all  technical 
terms,  the  use  of  short  sentences,  and  the  policy  of  saying 
no  more  than  is  necessary  to  render  a  provision  intelligible 
would  make  city  charters  less  forbidding  in  length  and 
more  intelligible  to  ordinary  citizens. 

REFERENCES 

A  great  deal  of  useful  information  concerning  the  relation  of  the  city 
to  the  state  has  been  brought  together  in  A.  R.  Hatton's  Digest  of  City 
Charters  (Chicago,  1906),  especially  pp.  1-48;  in  J.  F.  Dillon's  Law  of 
Municipal  Corporations  (5  vols.,  Boston,  1911),  I.  140—472 ;  and  in  Eugene 
McQuillin's  Law  of  Municipal  Corporations  (6  vols.,  Chicago,  1911-1912), 
I.  chs.  iv.,  ix.  Interesting  general  discussions  may  be  found  in  H.  E. 
Deming's  Government  of  American  Cities  (New  York,  1909),  especially 
chs.  iii.,  ix.,  xii. ;  in  F.  J.  Goodnow's  Municipal  Home  Rule  (New  York, 
1903),  chs.  iv.-v.,  and  in  his  Municipal  Government  (New  York,  1909), 
ch.  viii. 

The  relative  merits  of  the  general  and  special  charter  systems  are  dis- 
cussed in  the  National  Municipal  League's  Municipal  Program  (New 
York,  1900),  especially  pp.  36-58,  129-173;  in  the  introduction  to  The 
Municipal  Code  of  Ohio  (ed.  W.  H.  Ellis,  Cincinnati,  1909) ;  in  F.  J. 
Goodnow's  Municipal  Problems  (New  York,  1904),  ch.  iv. ;  and  in  J.  A. 
Fairlie's  Essays  in  Municipal  Administration  (New  York,  1908),  chs. 
v.-vi.  For  information  concerning  the  development  and  details  of  the 
home-rule  charter  system,  see  J.  F.  Dillon's  Law  of  Municipal  Cor- 
porations, I.  110-118;  M.  R.  Maltbie's  "City-made  Charters,"  in  Yale 
Review,  xiii.  380-407  (February,  1905) ;  Amasa  M.  Eaton's  article  on 
"The  Right  to  Local  Self-government,"  in  Harvard  Law  Review,  xiii. 
441-454  (February,  1900) ;  a  paper  on  "The  Progress  of  Home  Rule  in 
Cities,"  by  Ellis  P.  Oberholzer,  and  one  on  "The  Home  Rule  Law  for 
Michigan  Cities,"  by  G.  A.  Miller,  in  Proceedings  of  the  National 
Municipal  League  for  1904  and  1909  respectively ;  and  the  bulletin  on 
"Home  Rule  Charters,"  issued  by  the  Wisconsin  Library  Commission, 
Legislative  Reference  Department.  A  forcible  and  informing  presenta- 
tion of  the  arguments  in  favor  of  the  system  is  contained  in  the  booklet 
on  "Constitutional  Home  Rule  for  Ohio  Cities,"  prepared  under  the 
direction  of  Professor  A.  R.  Hatton  for  the  Municipal  Association  of 
Cleveland. 

On  the  art  of  drafting  a  city  charter  very  little  of  any  service  has  been 
written.  Types  of  charters  recently  adopted  in  various  American  cities 
(most  of  them  following  the  commission  plan)  are  printed  in  C.  A.  Beard's 
Digest  of  Short  Ballot  Charters  (New  York,  1911). 


CHAPTER  IV 

MUNICIPAL  POWERS  AND   RESPONSIBILITIES 

IT  has  been  pointed  out  in  the  preceding  chapter  that 
the  city,  being  a  municipal  corporation,  is  the  creature  of 
the  state.  Like  all  other  corporations,  it  owes  its  existence 
to  a  statute,  and  it  has  no  powers  save  those  which  may 
be  conveyed  to  it  thereby.  A  city  charter  is  accordingly  a 
grant  of  authority,  a  delegation  of  powers.  The  exact 
situation  has  been  tersely  stated  by  the  leading  American 
authority  on  the  law  of  municipal  corporations.  "It  is  a 
general  and  undisputed  proposition  of  law  that  a  municipal 
corporation  possesses  and  can  exercise  the  following  pow- 
ers and  no  others.  First,  those  granted  in  express  words ; 
second,  those  necessarily  or  fairly  implied  in  or  incident  to 
the  powers  expressly  granted;  third,  those  essential  to  the 
declared  objects  and  purposes  of  the  corporation,  —  not 
simply  convenient,  but  indispensable."  1 

This  principle,  as  has  been  pointed  out  in  a  well-known 
decision,  "is  fairly  derived  from  the  nature  of  corporations. 
In  aggregate  corporations,  as  a  general  rule,  the  act  and 
will  of  a  majority  is  deemed  in  law  the  act  and  will  of  the 
whole,  and  therefore  is  to  be  carried  into  effect  as  the  act 
of  the  corporate  body.  The  consequence  is  that  a  minority 
must  be  bound,  not  only  without  but  against  their  consent. 
Such  obligation  may  extend  to  every  onerous  duty,  to 
pay  money  to  an  unlimited  amount,  to  perform  services, 

1 J.  F.  Dillon,  The  Law  of  Municipal  Corporations  (5  vols. 
Boston,  1911),  I.  418  419.  On  the  general  subject  of  municipal  powers, 
see  also  Eugene  McQuillin,  The  Law  of  Municipal  Corporations  (6  vols., 
Chicago,  1911-1912),  I.  ch.  x. 

80 


MUNICIPAL  POWERS  AND  RESPONSIBILITIES         81 

to  surrender  lands,  and  the  like.  It  is  obvious,  therefore, 
that,  if  this  liability  were  to  extend  to  unspecified  and  in- 
definite objects,  the  citizen,  by  being  a  member  of  the 
corporation,  might  be  deprived  of  his  most  valuable  per- 
sonal rights  and  liberties.  The  security  against  this  danger 
is  in  a  steady  adherence  to  the  principle  stated,  that  cor- 
porations can  only  exercise  their  powers  over  their  respec- 
tive members  for  the  accomplishment  of  limited  and  well- 
defined  objects."  * 

Now,  it  is  a  general  rule  of  legal  interpretation,  in  keep-  Construc- 
ing  with  the  principles  just  enunciated,  that  the  charters  ^barters, 
granted  to  corporations  shall  be  construed  strictly.  In 
other  words,  the  onus  of  proving  the  possession  of  powers 
by  implication  is  upon  the  corporation.  In  general,  how- 
ever, this  rule  of  interpretation  has  not  been  rigorously 
applied  to  the  ordinary  clauses  of  charters  incorporating 
cities,  —  to  those,  for  example,  relating  to  the  organization 
of  municipal  government  and  the  functions  of  the  regular 
municipal  departments.  In  regard  to  the  construction  of 
such  clauses  the  courts  have  been  lenient ;  but  in  the  inter- 
pretation of  grants  of  powers  which  are  "out  of  the  usual 
range,  or  which  may  result  in  public  burdens,  or  which, 
in  their  exercise,  touch  the  right  to  liberty  or  property,  or, 
as  it  may  be  compendiously  expressed,  any  common  law 
right  of  the  citizen,"  2  —  in  all  such  matters  the  rigor  that 
is  applied  to  the  charters  of  private  corporations  is  applied 
to  city  charters  as  well.  One  of  the  powers  thus  out  of 
the  ordinary  range  is  that  authorizing  a  city  to  engage  in 
any  sort  of  public-utility  enterprise  not  directly  connected 
with  the  police  power  of  the  municipality. 

1  Spaulding  v.  Lowell,  23  Pickering  (Mass.),  71.    This  decision  may 
be  conveniently  found  in  J.  H.  Beale's  Selection  of  Cases  on  Municipal 
Corporations  (Cambridge,  1911),  240. 

2  J.  F.  Dillon,  Law  of  Municipal  Corporations,  I.  452—453. 


82 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Rules  of 
interpreta- 
tion. 


Scope  of 
powers 
usually 
granted. 


When  a  power  has  been  expressly  granted  to  a  city  by 
statute  and  the  mode  of  exercising  this  power  has  not  been 
stated  in  express  terms,  a  liberal  amount  of  discretion  is 
allowed  in  the  choice  of  methods.  The  express  grant  of  a 
power  carries  with  it  the  implication  of  authority  to  provide 
the  machinery  for  carrying  such  power  into  operation; 
and  as  to  the  best  means  of  doing  this  the  regular  mu- 
nicipal officials  are  allowed  full  discretion,  provided  this  dis- 
cretion be  used  in  a  reasonable  way.  Thus,  when  permis- 
sion to  erect  and  maintain  a  market-house  has  been  given 
to  a  city,  the  courts  will  not,  within  the  bounds  of  reason, 
interfere  with  the  city  authorities  in  determining  the  loca- 
tion or  the  size  or  the  design  of  the  building.1  Or  when 
permission  "to  open  streets  and  make  public  improve- 
ments thereon"  is  given,  the  methods  of  opening  and  im- 
proving are  left  to  the  discretion  of  the  appropriate  city 
authorities,  unless  they  have  been  prescribed  by  statute. 

The  powers  commonly  granted  to  a  municipal  corpora- 
tion, whether  in  express  words  or  by  implication,  are  not  easy 
to  classify,  for  they  cover  a  considerable  range.  In  most 
cities,  however,  they  may  be  grouped  under  six  main 
heads,  —  namely,  the  general  legislative  power  of  a  subor- 
dinate corporate  body,  the  police  power,  the  power  to  tax 
and  to  borrow,  the  power  to  appropriate  and  spend 
money,  the  power  to  enter  into  contracts,  and  the  power  to 
acquire,  manage,  and  dispose  of  property.  Every  Ameri- 
can city  has  all  of  these  general  powers  in  greater  or  less 
degree,  but  rarely  are  they  alike  in  any  two  cities.  In 
none  is  the  range  of  power  under  any  head  unlimited ;  and 
the  limitations  vary  not  only  in  different  states,  but  even 
in  different  cities  of  the  same  state.  What  the  exact  scope 
and  limits  of  a  given  city's  powers  are  under  each  of  these 
heads  is  something  ordinarily  known  to  no  one  but  the 
1  Spaulding  v.  Lowell,  23  Pickering  (Mass.),  71,  80. 


MUNICIPAL   POWERS  AND   RESPONSIBILITIES         83 

city's  legal  adviser,  and  not  always  even  to  him.  An  ac- 
curate knowledge  of  the  subject  can  be  had  only  through 
a  study  of  the  constitutional  provisions  relating  to  cities, 
of  the  general  statutes  covering  municipal  affairs,  of  the 
city  charter  and  the  amendments  to  it,  of  the  special  laws 
relating  to  the  city,  and  of  the  judicial  decisions  bearing 
upon  them.  To  master  all  this  is  not  an  easy  task.1 

In  the  second  place,  the  statutory  powers  of  a  city  may  Mandatory 
be  either  mandatory  or  permissive.  In  other  words,  a  ISsaivT 
city  may  be  invested  either  with  powers  which  it  must  p°wer<»- 
exercise  or  with  those  which  it  may  exercise  if  it  chooses  to 
do  so.  Whether  the  power  falls  into  one  class  or  the  other 
depends  upon  the  intention  of  the  legislature  that  granted 
it;  and  this  intention  is  usually  made  clear  by  the  lan- 
guage of  the  enactment.  If  the  statute  provides  that  a 
city  "shall"  or  "must"  do  something,  the  power  thus 
conferred  is  mandatory,  and  it  is  not  within  the  discretion 
of  the  city  authorities  to  refrain  from  exercising  it ;  but  if 
a  statute  provides  that  a  city  "may"  do  something,  or  that 
"it  shall  be  lawful"  for  a  city  to  do  something,  then  the 
power  conferred  is,  as  a  rule,  permissive,  and  the  municipal 
authorities  may  or  may  not  exercise  it.  They  may  not 
always  use  their  discretion,  however;  for  powers  granted 
in  permissive  language  may  be  mandatory  in  effect.  The 
courts  have  in  some  instances  held  that  a  power  conferred 
in  permissive  phraseology  must  be  exercised  if  there  is  a 
clear  public  benefit  to  be  derived  from  it.2 

1  A  group  of  decisions  on  the  general  powers  of  municipal  corporations 
may  be  found  in  J.  H.  Beale's  Selection  of  Cases  on  Municipal  Corpora- 
tions, 240-473. 

*  "It  is  the  settled  doctrine  in  New  York,  for  example,  that  where  a 
public  or  municipal  corporation  or  body  is  invested  with  power  to  do  an 
act  which  the  public  interests  require  to  be  done,  and  the  means  for  its  com- 
plete performance  are  placed  at  its  disposal,  not  only  the  execution,  but 
the  proper  execution  of  the  power,  may  be  insisted  on  as  a  duty,  though 
the  statute  conferring  it  be  only  permissive  in  its  terms." — Mayor  of 


84 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Powers 
may  not  be 
delegated. 


The  rule  in 
Hitchcock  ». 
Galveeton. 


Municipal 
ordinances. 


But  whether  derived  from  express  language  or  by  im- 
plication, and  whether  mandatory  or  permissive  in  effect, 
no  powers  which  are  conferred,  either  by  charter  or  by 
other  statute,  upon  the  governing  authorities  of  a  city,  to 
be  exercised  as  they  may  deem  best,  may  be  delegated  to 
any  subordinate  official  or  body.  Powers  committed  to  the 
mayor,  to  be  used  at  his  discretion,  cannot  be  delegated 
by  him  to  a  board  or  a  commissioner;  powers  given  to  the 
city  council  cannot  be  transferred  by  it  to  the  mayor  or  to  a 
committee.  All  this,  however,  does  not  apply  to  purely  min- 
isterial functions,  or,  in  other  words,  to  the  carrying  out  of 
administrative  details.  The  supreme  court  of  the  United 
States  has  held  that  the  performance  of  such  work  by  agents 
does  not  constitute  an  unlawful  delegation  of  powers  by  a 
city  council.1  An  ordinance  empowering  the  city  engineer 
to  make  a  selection  between  two  kinds  of  paving  material, 
or  to  determine  the  grade  of  a  sewer,  would  furnish  an  ex- 
ample of  delegated  ministerial  functions.  The  line  between 
discretionary  and  ministerial  offices  is  not  very  sharply 
drawn;  but  the  disposition  of  the  courts  seems  to  have 
been,  on  the  whole,  to  decide  against  delegation  in  all  very 
doubtful  cases.  Any  concession  to  a  subordinate  board  of 
officials  which  seems  capable  of  embarrassing  the  regular 
governing  organs  of  a  city  in  their  exercise  of  governmental 
powers,  or  of  restraining  them  from  a  full  performance  of 
their  public  functions,  is  usually  deemed  an  unlawful  dele- 
gation.2 

The  usual  medium  through  which  the  governing  authori- 

New  York  v.  Farze,  3  Hill,  612 ;  cited  by  J.  F.  Dillon,  Law  of  Municipal 
Corporations,  I.  466.  See  also  the  discussion  of  mandatory  and  discre- 
tionary powers  in  Eugene  McQuillin's  Law  of  Municipal  Corporations,  I. 
836-838. 

1  Hitchcock  v.  Galveston,  96  U.  S.  341. 

*  See  the  list  of  cases  given  in  Eugene  McQuillin's  Law  of  Munici- 
pal Corporations,  I.  842. 


85 

ties  of  the  city  (i.e.,  the  mayor  and  city  council,  or,  in 
cities  that  have  adopted  the  system  of  government  by  com- 
mission, the  commission)  put  the  powers  of  the  munici- 
pal corporation  into  activity  is  the  ordinance.  Within  the 
scope  of  this  term  are  included  all  "local  laws  of  a  municipal 
corporation,  duly  enacted  by  the  proper  authorities,  pre- 
scribing general,  uniform,  and  permanent  rules  of  conduct 
relating  to  the  corporate  affairs  of  the  municipality." l 
Powers  given  to  a  city  by  its  charter  or  by  other  statutes 
are  usually  coupled  with  a  provision  that  the  city  council 
or  other  legislative  organ  of  city  government  shall  have 
authority  to  carry  these  powers  into  operation  by  appro- 
priate ordinances.  It  is  by  ordinances  that  most  cities 
have  organized  their  various  administrative  departments. 
One  ordinance  deals  with  the  police  department,  another 
with  streets  and  street  traffic,  another  with  fire  protection, 
another  with  building  regulations,  and  so  on.  Each  pre- 
scribes in  detail  not  only  the  way  in  which  the  department 
shall  be  organized,  its  personnel,  and  the  relation  of  the 
various  officers,  but,  even  to  minute  particulars,  the  manner 
in  which  its  work  must  be  carried  on.  In  some  cases  the 
charter  or  other  statutes  give  to  certain  administrative 
bodies,  such  as  the  board  of  health  or  the  tenement-house 
commission,  or  even  to  a  single  official,  the  power  to  make 
rules  and  regulations  within  their  respective  fields  of  juris- 
diction. These  are  termed  "regulations,"  not  ordinances; 
but  in  general  they  have  all  the  force  of  ordinances,  and 
they  are  subject  to  the  same  general  restrictions.2 

1  Eugene  MoQuillin,    The  Law    of   Municipal    Ordinances    (Chicago, 
1904),  2.    Judge  Dillon  (Law  of  Municipal  Corporations,  II.  892)  defines  the 
term  "ordinances"  as  including  all  "acts  or  regulations  in  the  nature  of 
local  laws   passed  by  the   proper  assembly  or  governing  body  of  the 
corporation." 

2  Both  ordinances  and  regulations,  as  above  defined,  are  sharply  dis- 
tinguished from  resolutions  or  orders.    Ordinances  and  regulations  almost 


86 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Limitations 
upon  the 
ordinance 
power. 


1.  General 
limitations. 


2.  Ordi- 
nances 
must  be 
reasonable. 


In  the  exercise  of  their  powers  by  ordinance  (or  by  regu- 
lations) the  governing  bodies  of  the  city  are  subject  to 
several  important  limitations.  Some  of  these  are  of  a 
general  nature,  merely  representing  the  application  to 
municipal  law-making  of  those  principles  which  apply  to 
state  legislation.  An  ordinance  must  not,  for  example,  be 
inconsistent  with  the  provisions  of  the  charter  or  the  statute 
under  which  it  is  passed.  When  a  state  statute  and  a 
municipal  ordinance  are  in  conflict,  the  latter  is  of  course 
invalid.  To  be  valid,  likewise,  a  municipal  ordinance  must 
be  passed  with  due  respect  to  the  prescribed  formalities. 
An  ordinance  is  more  than  a  mere  resolution  of  the  council ; 
when  there  are  standing  requirements  that  it  must  be  intro- 
duced in  a  certain  way,  be  submitted  to  three  readings, 
and  be  approved  by  the  mayor  before  going  into  effect, 
these  formalities  must  be  observed.  But  in  addition  to 
these  general  rules  there  are  some  of  a  more  special  char- 
acter. 

In  the  first  place,  an  ordinance  must  be  reasonable  or  it 
will  be  voided  by  the  courts ;  but  it  is  presumed  to  be  reason- 
able until  the  contrary  is  shown.  Unreasonableness  can  be 
demonstrated  either  by  an  examination  of  the  ordinance 
itself  or  by  an  investigation  of  a  specific  situation  to  which 
it  would  apply.  There  are,  of  course,  no  general  rules  for 
.determining  what  is  reasonable  and  what  is  not ;  each  case 
must  be  decided  on  its  own  merits.  Ordinances  have, 
however,  been  so  often  attacked  in  the  courts  on  this  ground 

invariably  prescribe  permanent  rules  of  conduct  or  government;  resolu- 
tions or  orders  provide  temporary  rules  only.  A  resolution  may  ordi- 
narily be  passed  by  the  council  alone,  whereas  an  ordinance  usually  re- 
quires the  approval  of  the  mayor,  or  of  the  chief  executive  authority. 
The  legislative  powers  of  the  corporation  must,  as  a  rule,  be  exercised 
by  ordinance ;  its  day-to-day  ministerial  functions  may  often  be  carried 
out  by  resolutions.  See  the  cases  bearing  on  these  points  in  McQuillin, 
Law  of  Municipal  Ordinances,  4 ;  and  Dillon,  Law  of  Municipal  Corpora- 
tions, II.  893-896. 


MUNICIPAL  POWERS  AND   RESPONSIBILITIES         87 

that  there  is  now  at  hand  a  considerable  body  of  precedents 
to  guide  the  legal  authorities  of  a  city  in  advising  a  city 
council  whether  or  not  any  proposed  measure  would  be 
upheld.1  As  a  rule,  the  courts  have  given  the  ordinance 
the  benefit  of  any  serious  doubt;  the  burden  of  proof  is 
put  upon  him  who  asserts  unreasonableness.  It  may 
not  infrequently  happen  that  an  ordinance  is  reasonable 
as  applied  to  one  situation  and  unreasonable  as  applied 
to  another.  In  such  cases  it  may  be  enforced  in  one 
case  and  prove  to  be  unenforceable  in  the  other.  An 
ordinance  is  prima  facie  unreasonable,  and  therefore  void, 
if  it  is  oppressive  in  character  ;  it  must  not  be  inconsistent 
with  a  reasonable  degree  of  personal  liberty.2  Thus,  a 
Baltimore  ordinance  which  forbade  any  person  to  use  a 
steam-engine  within  the  city  limits  except  on  permission 
of  the  mayor  was  held  to  be  oppressive  and  void  because 
it  sought  to  put  within  the  discretion  of  a  single  officer  a 
practically  absolute  power  over  the  use  of  steam  in  the 
city.3  It  should  be  borne  in  mind,  however,  that  if  an 
ordinance  is  passed  under  a  special  statutory  grant  of 
power,  and  in  accordance  with  the  terms  and  tenor  of  such 
grant,  the  reasonableness  of  the  ordinance  cannot  usually 
be  attacked.  Moreover,  it  is  for  the  judge,  not  for  the 
jury,  to  decide  whether  an  ordinance  is  reasonable  or  not. 

In  the  second  place,  ordinances  must  not  make  special  3.  Ordi- 
or  unwarranted  discriminations.     When  they  grant  privi- 


1  An  excellent  illustration  of  the  distinction  between  an  unreasonable 
and   a   reasonable   ordinance   may   be    found   in   Northern  Liberties  v.   discrimina- 
Northern  Liberties  Gas  Co.  (12  Pa.  318),  a  Pennsylvania  case  decided  in  tions. 
1859.     An  ordinance  forbidding  the  gas  company  to  open  a  paved  street 
at  any  time  for  the  purpose  of  laying  gas-pipes  from  its  trunk  main  to 
houses  abutting  the  street  was  held  to  be  unreasonable  ;   one  prohibiting 
it  from  thus  opening  a  paved  street  from  December  to  March  in  each  year 
was  declared  to  be  reasonable.     See  McQuillin,  Law  of  Municipal  Ordi- 
nances, 188,  300. 

*  Cf.  J.  F.  Dillon,  Law  of  Municipal  Corporations,  II.  929. 

1  Baltimore  v.  Radecke,  49  Md.  217. 


88  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

leges,  they  must  make  these  privileges  open  to  all  upon 
the  same  terms  and  conditions ;  when  they  impose  restric- 
tions, they  must  make  them  applicable  to  all  persons  in  the 
same  circumstances  or  the  same  class.  An  ordinance  must 
not  single  out  an  individual  and  compel  him  to  do  some- 
thing under  penalty  of  fine;  it  must  not  discriminate  in 
favor  of  residents  as  against  non-residents,1  or  in  favor  cf 
some  residents  as  against  others  engaged  in  the  same  busi- 
ness.2 On  the  other  hand,  an  ordinance  is  not  to  be  re- 
garded as  discriminatory  because,  although  its  provisions 
are  couched  in  general  terms,  its  force  happens  from  the 
nature  of  things  to  fall  upon  one  individual  or  concern. 
It  is  within  the  power  of  the  city  council  to  make  classifi- 
cations (provided  they  be  reasonable  ones),  and  to  restrict 
the  application  of  an  ordinance  to  any  one  class.  The 
general  rule,  which  applies  alike  to  statutes  and  to  ordinances, 
was  firmly  stated  many  years  ago  in  a  notable  supreme- 
court  decision.3 

4.  Ordi-  Finally,  an  ordinance  must  not  have  the  effect  of  un- 

nrnsTnot  warrantedly  interfering  with  or  restraining  trade.  If  it 
ahTratrain  does,  ^  ^^  ^e  ^e^  void.  This  is  not  to  imply,  however, 
trade.  that  ordinances  may  not  subject  trade  to  reasonable  regu- 

lations.    It  has,  for  example,  been  decided  in  a  well-known 

1  "The  specific  regulation  of  one  kind  of  business,  which  may  be  neces- 
sary for  the  protection  of  the  public,  can  never  be  a  just  ground  of  com- 
plaint because  like  restrictions  are  not  imposed  upon  other  business  of  a 
different  kind.  The  discriminations  which  are  open  to  objection  are 
those  where  persons  engaged  in  the  same  business  are  subject  to  different 
restrictions,  or  are  held  to  different  privileges  under  the  same  conditions." 
—  Soon  Hing  v.  Crowley,  113  U.  S.  703,  in  Macy's  Cases,  214. 

8  Ex  parte  Frank,  52  Cat.  606. 

*  "Though  the  law  itself  be  fair  on  its  face  and  impartial  in  appear- 
ance, yet,  if  it  is  applied  and  administered  by  public  authority  with  an 
evil  eye  and  an  unequal  hand,  so  as  practically  to  make  unjust  and  illegal 
discriminations  between  persons  in  similar  circumstances,  material  to 
then*  rights,  the  denial  of  justice  is  still  within  the  prohibition  of  the 
Constitution."— Tick  Wo  v,  Hopkins,  118  U.S.  356,  printed  in  J.  B. 
Thayer's  Cases  on  Constitutional  Law  (2  vols.,  Cambridge,  1895),  I.  774. 


MUNICIPAL  POWERS  AND  RESPONSIBILITIES         89 

case  that  ordinances  requiring  coal  to  be  weighed  at  the 
city  scales  are  entirely  allowable.1  Those,  on  the  contrary, 
which  restrain  competition  for  public  works  have  generally 
been  held  void.2  Every  regulation  of  trade  is,  of  course,  a 
restraint  upon  it  in  some  direction;  but  if  the  measure 
seems  designed  to  secure  a  public  good,  and  if  it  imposes 
no  more  restraint  than  is  necessary  to  achieve  this  end,  the 
ordinance  will  be  sustained.  Not  that  it  is  enough  merely 
to  avow  a  public  purpose;  ordinances  bearing  in  their 
preambles  specious  professions  of  solicitude  for  the  public 
welfare  have  often  been  disallowed.  It  must  be  demon- 
strated that  regulation  in  the  public  interest  is  plainly 
desirable.  On  this  paramount  consideration  for  the  public 
health,  safety,  and  general  welfare  is  based  the  system 
of  requiring  licenses  to  be  taken  out  by  all  persons  engaged 
in  certain  trades  or  occupations,  a  requirement  which  forms 
part  of  the  machinery  employed  by  the  city  in  the  exercise 
of  its  "police  power,"  and  which  does  not  within  reasonable 
limits  operate  against  the  citizen's  right  to  an  unrestrained 
pursuit  of  this  trade. or  calling.  As  a  monopoly,  on  the 
other  hand,  is  a  restraint  of  trade,  a  municipal  corporation 
cannot  by  ordinance  grant  to  any  company  an  exclusive 
right  to  use  its  streets  unless  it  has  obtained  from  the  legis- 
lature express  permission  to  do  so.3  Exclusive  franchises, 
given  without  express  statutory  authority,  have  usually 
been  regarded  as  not  warranted  by  any  considerations  of 
public  welfare.  Furthermore,  no  franchise  will  be  con- 
strued to  be  exclusive  by  implication;  it  must  say  in  un- 
mistakable terms  that  it  is  so.4 

1  Davis  v.  Anita,  73  Iowa,  325. 

2  Atlanta  v.  Stein,  111  Ga.  789. 

8  Long  v.  Duluth,  49  Minn.  280. 

4  On  the  whole  question  of  municipal  powers  in  the  matter  of  exclusive- 
franchise  grants,  see  O.  L.  Pond,  Municipal  Control  of  Public  Utilities 
(New  York,  1906),  ch.  viii. 


90 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Effect  of  It  will  be  seen  from  the  foregoing  discussion  that  not  only 

these 

restrictions,  are  the  powers  of  the  city  limited  to  fields  expressly  or 
impliedly  plotted  out  for  it  by  legislative  enactment,  but 
that  even  within  these  limits  the  municipal  corporation 
must  put  its  authority  into  operation  under  strict  limitations. 
Such  powers  as  it  has  obtained  by  general  grant  it  must  use 
in  a  reasonable  way,  without  discrimination  and  without 
unwarranted  interference  in  the  common  right  to  freedom 
of  trade.  The  logical  result  of  all  this  circumscription  is 
that  cities  are  constant  suppliants  at  the  bar  of  the  legisla- 
ture. If  there  be  any  doubt  as  to  the  scope  of  their  powers, 
or  as  to  the  manner  in  which  their  authority  may  be  exer- 
cised, the  easiest  course,  as  a  rule,  is  to  seek  such  specific 
statutory  action  as  will  make  everything  clear.  It  is  in 
considerable  degree  to  this  situation  that  the  plethora  of 
special  legislation  commented  upon  in  the  preceding  chapter 
owes  its  existence.  The  European  practice  of  permitting 
a  city  to  do  its  work  under  broad  grants  of  power,  of  assum- 
ing that  it  may  do  whatever  it  is  not  forbidden  to  do,  and  of 
giving  it  wide  freedom  to  choose  its  own  manner  of  doing 
it,  has  done  much  to  save  the  municipal  systems  of  France 
and  Prussia  from  the  maelstrom  of  special  legislation.  It  is, 
moreover,  one  of  the  ironies  of  political  history  that  the 
necessity  of  constant  mendicancy  for  doles  of  power  should 
exist  in  a  land  where  there  is  a  historic  pride  in  free  local 
institutions. 

In  all  well-ordered  governments  power  goes  hand  in  hand 
with  responsibility.     In  the  nation  and  the  state  this  re- 

corporations.  sponsibility  is  popular  rather  than  legal ;  in  other  words, 
the  government  is  responsible  to  the  people  at  the  polls, 
not  to  individuals  who  may  desire  to  hale  it  before  the 
courts  of  law.  A  national  or  a  state  government  is  legally 
irresponsible,  save  in  so  far  as  it  may  of  its  own  free  will 
submit  itself  to  the  jurisdiction  of  courts.  This  it  may  do, 


Responsi- 
bilities of 
municipal 


MUNICIPAL  POWERS  AND   RESPONSIBILITIES         91 

and  often  does,  by  special  statutes  permitting  suits  to  be 
brought  against  it.  A  city,  on  the  contrary,  is  in  no  such 
favored  position.  Not  only  is  the  municipal  government 
responsible  to  the  voters,  but  the  corporation  may  be  cited 
before  the  ordinary  courts  of  justice,  whether  with  or  with- 
out the  consent  of  its  governing  authorities,  and  may  there 
be  made  the  defendant  in  suits  at  law.  The  city  is  liable  to 
be  sued  on  actions  of  contract,  or  for  the  torts  of  its  agents, 
or  in  causes  arising  out  of  its  possession  of  municipal  prop- 
erty. Its  liability  is  not,  however,  equally  complete  in  all 
three  classes  of  actions. 

In  the  matter  of  contracts  the  city  is  subject  to  substan-  Contracts, 
tially  the  same  rules  as  are  applied  to  individuals  or  to 
private  corporations.1  A  suit  that  can  be  successfully 
prosecuted  against  an  individual  can  in  the  same  essen- 
tial facts  be  prosecuted  against  a  municipality.  In  an 
action  for  breach  of  contract  the  city  can  urge  only  the 
same  pleas  and  defences  that  are  open  to  the  individual 
defendant ;  it  has  no  immunities  by  reason  of  being  a  public 
corporation.  It  matters  not  whether  the  contract  has  been 
entered  into  for  a  governmental  or  for  a  commercial  purpose ; 
the  degree  of  liability  for  breach  is  the  same.2 

In  the  matter  of  liability  for  the  torts,  or  civil  wrongs,  Torts, 
committed  by  its  agents  or  employees,  on  the  other  hand, 
the  status  of  the  city  is  not  so  simple.  A  municipal  cor- 
poration, so  far  as  the  acts  of  its  officials  are  concerned, 
stands  in  a  dual  position.  On  the  one  hand,  it  is  part  of 
the  machinery  created  and  used  by  the  state  for  carrying 
out  the  sovereign  functions  of  the  latter.  For  the  improper 

1  The  reason  for  this  is  well  stated  in  F.  J.  Goodnow's  Municipal  Home 
Rule  (New  York,  1906),  106. 

2  The  municipal  corporation  may,  of  course,  like  any  other  corporate 
body,  set  up  the  defence  that  the  contract  was  entered  into  outside  the 
scope  of  its  chartered  powers,  or  that  it  was  not  made  by  its  proper  officers 
or  agents. 


92 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


exercise  of  these  functions  the  state  itself  has  no  legal  lia- 
bility, nor  can  any  attach  to  those  who  carry  out  these 
functions  under  its  authority.  The  city,  therefore,  so  far 
as  it  is  an  agency  of  state  government  performing  govern- 
mental functions,  cannot  be  held  responsible  for  the  torts  of 
its  officials  or  employees.  But  the  city  is  also  a  corpora- 
tion, engaged  very  often  in  commercial  or  semi-commer- 
cial enterprises.  It  is  a  purveyor  of  water,  gas,  or  electricity. 
As  such  it  is  not  performing  strictly  governmental  functions, 
and  hence  must  assume  the  same  liabilities  as  a  private  cor- 
poration engaged  in  the  same  undertakings.1 

In  keeping  with  these  general  principles,  it  may  be  as- 
serted that  a  city  is  not  liable  to  civil  prosecution  either  for 
the  non-exercise  of  the  powers  of  subordinate  legislation 
given  to  it  by  statute  or  for  the  manner  in  which  it  exercises 
them.  It  is  not  liable  for  its  neglect  to  provide  ordinances, 
or  for  its  failure  to  enforce  them  when  provided.  Such 
liability  may  be  expressly  established  by  statute,  but  it 
will  not  be  implied.  If  an  individual  is  injured  through  the 
failure  of  the  city  council  to  provide  or  to  enforce  an  ordi- 
nance regulating  the  storage  of  explosives,  he  can  recover  no 
damages  from  the  city  treasury.2  Nor  does  the  failure  of 
the  municipal  corporation  to  exercise  its  statutory  power  to 
abate  a  nuisance  give  a  person  who  is  injured  by  the  existence 
of  such  nuisance  an  enforceable  claim  against  the  city, 


1  "There  are  two  kinds  of  duties  which  are  imposed  upon  municipal 
corporations :  one  is  that  kind  which  arises  from  the  grant  of  a  special 
power  in  the  exercise  of  which  the  municipality  is  as  a  legal  individual ; 
the  other  is  of  that  kind  which  arises,  or  is  implied,  from  the  use  of  po- 
litical rights  under  the  general  law,  under  the  exercise  of  which  it  is  as  a 
sovereign.  The  former  power  is  private  and  is  used  for  private  purposes ; 
the  latter  is  public  and  is  used  for  public  purposes."  —  Lloyd  v.  the  Mayor, 
5  N.  Y.  374.  See  also  J.  H.  Beale,  Selection  of  Cases  on  Municipal  Cor- 
porations, 594. 

1  McDade  t».  Chester,  117  Pa.  414,  in  Beale's  Selection  of  Cases  on 
Municipal  Corporations,  583. 


MUNICIPAL  POWERS  AND  RESPONSIBILITIES         93 

even  though  he  has  duly  notified  the  officials  of  the  nuisance 
and  requested  them  to  use  their  statutory  powers  in  securing 
its  abatement.1  Most  cities  have  ordinances  regulating  the 
construction  of  buildings  in  the  interest  of  protection  against 
collapse  or  conflagration  ;  but  if  such  an  ordinance  be  not 
enforced,  and  if  injury  to  the  persons  or  property  of  private 
individuals  be  caused  thereby,  no  action  for  damages  can 
be  successfully  prosecuted  against  the  municipality.2  The 
United  States  supreme  court  has  gone  even  farther,  by  laying 
down  the  principle  that,  even  if  a  city  misinterprets  the 
scope  of  its  statutory  powers  and  undertakes  to  do  in  a 
governmental  capacity  what  it  has  no  authority  to  do, 
it  cannot  be  successfully  sued  in  an  action  of  tort.3  The 
power  to  enact  and  to  enforce  ordinances  is  a  governmental 
power,  discretionary  in  its  nature;  and  for  negligence  or 
mistake  in  connection  with  it  the  city  has  no  legal  liability. 

A  municipal  corporation  must  of  necessity  carry  out  its  Responsi- 
functions,  whether  governmental  or  commercial,  whether 
public  or  private,  by  means  of  officials,  agents,  and  employ- 


ees  ;  and  by  a  general  principle  of  law  it  becomes  responsible  engaged  in 
for  what  some  of  them  do.     Certain  classes  of  city  officials  mental 

a  !  1-1  ,    i  functions. 

and  employees  are  engaged  in  purely  governmental  or 
public  work,  others  are  just  as  clearly  employed  in  commer- 
cial or  private  undertakings  conducted  by  the  city.  For 
the  acts  of  the  former  class  the  city  is  not  liable,  but  it  is 
held  accountable  for  torts  committed  by  the  latter  in  the 
discharge  of  their  duties.  A  good  example  of  the  class 
engaged  in  the  performance  of  strictly  public  or  govern- 
mental functions  is  furnished  by  the  city  fire  department. 
In  the  absence  of  express  statutory  provisions  creating 
liability,  the  municipality  is  not  subject  to  claims  for  damages 

1  Davis  v.  Montgomery,  51  Ala.  139  ;   Kiley  v.  Kansas,  87  Mo.  103. 
1  Forsyth  v.  Atlanta,  45  Ga.  152. 
,»  Fowle  v.  Alexandria,  3  Peters,  398. 


94  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

caused  by  the  negligence  or  the  inefficiency  of  this  body.1 
Other  officials  and  employees  who  are  regarded  as  exercising 
public  functions  of  this  class  are  those  connected  with  the 
parks  department,2  with  the  city's  hospital  and  health 
service,3  or  with  the  municipal  administration  of  poor 
relief.4  The  doctrine  which  exempts  the  city  from  legal 
responsibility  for  negligence  or  inefficiency  on  the  part  of 
such  officials  often  results  in  loss  to  private  individuals, 
who  are  thus  deprived  of  all  effective  redress,  since  to  sue 
the  official  personally  is  not  usually  a  profitable  proceeding. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  system  is  defensible  upon  grounds 
of  practical  policy ;  for,  since  the  city  performs  such  functions 
as  the  protection  of  property  from  fire,  the  maintenance  of 
parks,  the  establishment  of  hospitals,  and  the  care  of  the 
poor  without  hope  or  possibility  of  profit,  it  cannot  reason- 
ably be  expected  to  penalize  itself  for  every  lapse  from  effi- 
ciency. To  require  the  municipal  corporation  to  insure 
citizens  against  mishaps  in  such  departments  would  be  to 
require  a  guarantee  of  official  infallibility  backed  by  the 
resources  of  the  municipal  treasury.  Under  a  system  of 
popular  government  the  maintenance  of  such  a  doctrine 
would  prove  rather  costly  to  the  taxpayer. 

The  status  of  the  police  department  is  somewhat  different 
from  that  of  the  departments  just  mentioned.  Police  officers 
are  unquestionably  engaged  in  the  performance  of  a  govern- 
mental or  public  function,  and  hence  for  their  sins  of  omission 
or  commission  the  city  would  not  be  liable.  But  the  exemp- 
tion of  the  municipal  corporation  from  liability  for  the  torts 

1  Hafford  v.  New  Bedford,  16  Gray  (Mass.),  297;  Taintor  v.  Worcester, 
123  Mass.  311.     See  also  Wheeler  v.  Cincinnati,  19  Ohio,  19,  and  Hayes 
v.  Oshkosh,  33  Wis.  314,   in  Beale's   Cases   on  Municipal   Corporations, 
618-620. 

2  Louisville  Park  Commissioners  v,  Prinz,  127  Ky.  460. 

1  Gilboy  v.  Detroit,   115  Mich.  121,  in  Beale's  Cases  on  Municipal 
Corporations,  582 ;  also  Maximilian  v.  the  Mayor,  62  N.  Y.  160. 
4  Curran  v.  Boston,  151  Afass.  505. 


MUNICIPAL  POWERS  AND  RESPONSIBILITIES         95 

of  its  police  officers  is  more  commonly  based  upon  the  plea 
that  they  are  not  municipal  but  state  agents.  They  are, 
as  a  rule,  appointed  by  city  authorities,  are  paid  from  the 
city  treasury,  and  are  instructed  in  the  performance  of  their 
duties  by  municipal  regulations.  But  all  this  does  not  make 
them  municipal  officers;  it  merely  represents  what  the 
state  has  found  to  be  a  convenient  method  of  securing  per- 
formance of  a  recognized  function  of  state  government,  — 
that  of  preserving  the  public  peace  and  order.  Even  in  en- 
forcing municipal  ordinances  the  police  act  as  agents  of  the 
state.  The  authority  to  make  these  ordinances  "is  delegated 
to  the  city  by  the  sovereign  power,  and  the  exercise  of  the 
authority  gives  to  such  enactments  the  same  force  and  effect 
as  if  they  had  been  passed  directly  by  the  legislature.  They 
are  public  laws  of  a  limited  and  local  operation  designed  to 
secure  good  order  and  to  provide  for  the  welfare  and  comfort 
of  the  inhabitants.  In  their  enforcement,  therefore,  police 
officers  act  in  their  public  capacity  and  not  as  agents  or 
servants  of  the  city."1  Upon  similar  grounds,  the  city  is 
not  liable  for  negligence  in  the  performance  of  functions, 
not  strictly  police  in  nature,  which  are  nevertheless  some- 
times intrusted  to  police  officers,  —  as,  for  example,  the 
granting  of  permits,  the  listing  of  voters,  and  so  on. 

All  of  the  foregoing  functions  are  clearly  governmental,  For  the 
or  public.     Some  others  are  quite  as  clearly  commercial,  agents 
or  private.     When,  for  example,  a  city  owns  and  operates  JJJJSgove 
a  system  of  water-supply  from  which  it  derives  revenue  or  mental 

J  .     functions. 

profit,  it  becomes  liable  for  damages  resulting  from  the  negli- 
gence or  the  incapacity  of  its  employees  connected  with  the 
working  of  the  system.  Its  liability  is  the  same,  both  in 
nature  and  degree,  as  that  of  a  water  company;2  and  the 

1  Buttrick  v.  Lowell,  1  Allen  (Mass.),  172,  in  Beale's  Cases  on  Munici- 
pal Corporations,  580. 

2  Murphy  v.  Lowell,  124  Mass.  564. 


96  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

same  rule  would  apply  to  it  as  owner  of  a  gas  plant  or  an 
electric-lighting  plant.1  Municipal  ownership  of  docks  and 
wharves,  where  tolls  are  charged,  subject  the  city  to  the 
same  legal  liabilities  that  pertain  to  a  private  owner.2  It 
has  also  been  held  that  a  municipal  corporation  is  responsible 
for  damages  caused  by  the  faulty  management  of  public 
cemeteries,  markets,  and  wash-houses.3  All  these  depart- 
ments of  municipal  enterprise  are  within  the  range  of  private 
or  commercial  functions.  When  a  city  enters  into  competi- 
tion with  private  corporations,  it  should  of  course  assume 
responsibilities  similar  to  those  attaching  to  the  latter. 
When  it  displaces  a  private  enterprise  in  favor  of  municipal 
ownership,  it  ought  not  thereby  to  impair  the  redress  hith- 
erto available  for  negligent  or  inefficient  operation.  The 
damages  in  which  the  city  may  be  mulcted  for  the  torts  of 
its  employees  in  these  branches  of  municipal  activity  may 
properly  be  made  a  part  of  the  cost  of  operation  to  be  covered 
by  charges  levied  for  the  service.  Municipal  liability  for 
the  exercise  of  private  or  commercial  functions  seems  thus 
to  be  an  entirely  defensible  doctrine. 

What  are  Thus  far  the  distinction  between  public  and  private  func- 
?unctions?  tions  has  not  been  difficult  to  draw;  but  there  is  a  con- 
siderable field  of  civic  activity  which  does  not  readily  and 
at  first  sight  fall  into  either  of  these  classes.  As  regards 
the  construction  and  care  of  streets,  for  example,  the  provi- 
sion of  sewers,  the  removal  of  ashes  and  garbage,  and  so  on, 
the  principles  governing  municipal  liability  are  not  sc 
easily  described.  In  most  states  of  the  Union  the  courts 
have  held  that  municipal  corporations  are  liable  for  negli- 
gence in  the  performance  of  their  duty  to  keep  the  city 

1  Kibele  v.  Philadelphia,  105  Pa.  41 ;  Greenville  v.  Pitts,  102  Texas,  1. 

*  Allegheny  v.  Campbell,  107  Pa.  530. 

*  On  the  detailed  application  of  this  rule,  see  D.  A.  Jones,  The  Negli- 
gence of  Municipal  Corporations  (New  York,  1892),  71. 


MUNICIPAL  POWERS  AND   RESPONSIBILITIES         97 

streets  in  proper  condition ;  but  for  a  similar  default  towns 
and  counties  have  been  held  to  be  not  liable.1  On  the  face 
of  things,  there  would  seem  to  be  no  good  reason  for  this 
distinction,  and  the  courts  have  not  been  very  successful  in 
providing  one.  It  is  sometimes  urged  that  the  streets  of 
cities  are  local  thoroughfares,  whereas  the  streets  of  towns 
and  villages  are  state  highways,  —  that  the  former  are  means 
of  communication,  the  latter  means  of  intercommunication ; 
but  that  is  true  in  a  general  way  only,  and  scarcely  in  suffi- 
cient degree  to  warrant  the  broad  distinction  made  by  the 
decisions.  However  this  may  be,  the  care  of  the  city's 
streets  is  in  most  states  regarded  as  a  local  duty ;  and,  when 
a  tort  arises  from  the  negligence  or  the  incapacity  of  an 
official  intrusted  with  this  function,  the  doctrine  of  respondeat 
superior  applies,  and  the  city  may  be  sued  for  damages.2  In 
regard  to  the  sewerage  system,  the  general  principle,  so  far 
as  the  decisions  may  be  said  to  establish  a  general  principle, 
is  that  the  city  authorities,  in  planning  a  system  of  sewers, 
are  performing  a  public  and  discretionary  function,  and 
hence  are  not  liable  for  injuries  arising  from  faulty  planning, 
as,  for  example,  from  the  construction  of  sewers  too  small 
to  serve  their  purpose  properly.  The  task  of  keeping  the 
sewers  free  from  obstruction,  however,  and  otherwise  in 
proper  repair  is  a  ministerial  function,  for  negligence  in  the 
performance  of  which  the  city  is  liable.3  Much  diversity  of 

1  F.  J.  Goodnow,  Municipal  Home  Rule,  144-146.     See  also  Russell 
v.  The  Men  of  Devon  (1788),  in  Beale's  Cases  on  Municipal  Corporations, 
530 ;    Mower  v.  The  Inhabitants  of  Leicester,  9  Mass.  237,  ibid.,  601 ; 
and  Detroit  v.  Blackeby,  21  Mich.  84,  ibid.,  603.     The  argument  of  Judge 
Gray  on  this  question,  in  Hill  v.  Boston  (122  Mass.  344,  369),  is  also  very 
interesting. 

2  The  whole  question  of  the  liability  of  the  city  in  the  matter  of  damage* 
to  property  caused  by  changing  the  grade  of  streets  is  too  technical  to 
be  discussed  here.     It  is  dealt  with  at  length  in  J.  F.  Dillon's  Law  of 
Municipal  Corporations,  IV.  2920  ff. 

1  Barton  v.  Syracuse,  36  N.  Y.  54,  in  Beale's  Cases  on  Municipal  Cor- 
porations, 611;    O'Donnell  v.  Syracuse,  184  N.  Y.  1,  ibid.,  611-612;  also 


98 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Responsi- 
bilities of 
the  city 
with  refer- 
ence to  its 
property. 


opinion  is  disclosed  by  the  decisions  bearing  upon  the  lia- 
bility of  a  municipal  corporation  for  the  torts  of  its  officials 
and  employees  engaged  in  cleaning  the  streets  and  in  remov- 
ing refuse  and  garbage.  In  some  cases  the  courts  have 
regarded  these  functions  as  governmental,  and  so  have  de- 
nied the  city's  liability ;  in  other  cases  they  have  ruled  that 
the  city,  in  performing  this  sort  of  work,  acts  in  a  private 
or  commercial  capacity,  and  must  therefore  assume  the  same 
liabilities  as  an  ordinary  corporation  or  individual.1 

The  legal  responsibility  of  the  city  extends  not  only  to 
torts  committed  by  its  officials  when  engaged  in  performing 
a  private  or  commercial  function  for  the  municipality,  but 
also  to  any  claims  that  may  arise  from  defects  in  city 
property  which  is  not  exclusively  devoted  to  governmental 
uses.  When  the  city  owns  and  uses  buildings  solely  for 
public  purposes,  as  the  city  hall,  the  schoolhouses,  the 
police  and  fire  stations,  it  is  ordinarily  not  liable  for 
damages  caused  by  negligence  in  the  construction  or  repair 
of  them.2  If,  however,  the  municipal  authorities  permit 
such  a  building  to  be  used  for  other  than  public  purposes, 
as  for  private  entertainments,  the  city  must  assume  lia- 
bility for  any  injuries  ensuing.3  This  is  a  branch  of  law 
upon  which  the  array  of  judicial  decisions  is  at  present  very 
perplexing.  The  general  drift  seems  to  be  in  the  direction 
of  extending  civic  liability,  even  in  the  case  of  property 
devoted  wholly  to  public  use.  Indeed,  the  manifest  desire 

the  various  decisions  printed  in  S.  D.  Thompson's  Cases  on  Municipal 
Negligence,  especially  II.  625  ff. 

1  See  the  cases  cited  in  J.  F.  Dillon's  Law  of  Municipal  Corporations, 
IV.  2900. 

1  There  have,  however,  been  a  good  many  exceptions  to  this  general 
rule.  See  F.  J.  Goodnow's  chapter  on  "The  Liability  of  Municipal  Cor- 
porations for  their  Management  of  Property,"  in  his  Municipal  Home 
Rule. 

1  Eastman  v.  Meredith,  36  N.  H.  296,  in  Beale's  Cases  on  Municipal 
Corporations,  571 ;  Oliver  v.  Worcester,  102  Mass.  489. 


MUNICIPAL  POWERS  AND   RESPONSIBILITIES         99 

of  the  courts  to  give  every  possible  security  to  the  rights 
of  individuals  has  impelled  them  in  recent  years  to  the  policy 
of  putting  municipal  corporations  upon  the  same  plane  of 
legal  responsibility  as  private  individuals,  so  far  as  property 
is  concerned. 

A  rather  special  field  of  municipal  powers  and  duties  is  Rights  and 
connected  with  the  relations  of  the  city  to  public-service 


companies.     This  is  a  subject  too  extensive  and  too  complex  in  relatjon 

to  public- 

to  be  dealt  with  in  any  general  treatise  on  municipal  govern-  service  cor- 
ment  ;  for  not  only  does  it  include  the  scope  and  the  limita-  F 
tions  of  municipal  franchise-granting  power,  but  it  involves 
such  important  questions  as  the  authority  of  the  city  to 
regulate  the  rates  charged  and  the  quality  of  the  service 
rendered.  On  these  points  even  the  general  principles  of 
law,  as  enunciated  in  judicial  decisions,  are  not  easily 
formulated;  but  two  rules  may  be  laid  down  with  some 
degree  of  assurance.  In  the  first  place,  the  courts  have  been 
rather  reluctant  to  abandon  the  old  notion  that  public 
advantage  can  be  best  secured  by  the  competition  of  two 
or  more  enfranchised  public-service  corporations  operating 
within  the  same  locality.  Students  of  applied  economics 
have  long  since  become  convinced  that  no  permanent,  effec- 
tive competition  in  a  natural  monopoly,  such  as  a  water,  gas, 
electric,  telephone,  or  transportation  service,  can  be  carried 
on  in  the  same  area  of  patronage.1  But  even  in  recent  years 
the  courts  have  held  that  benefits  will  accrue  to  the  public 
from  competition  in  the  operation  of  public  utilities,  and 
hence,  in  the  absence  of  express  statutory  authority,  have 
denied  the  power  of  the  municipality  to  grant  exclusive 

1  "There  are  some  general  principles  which  we  wish  to  present  as 
practically  the  unanimous  sentiment  of  our  committee.  First,  we  wish 
to  emphasize  the  fact  that  the  public  utilities  studied  are  so  constituted 
that  it  is  impossible  for  them  to  be  regulated  by  competition."  —  NATIONAL 
Civic  FEDERATION,  Report  on  Municipal  and  Private  Operation  of  Public 
Utilities  (3  vols.,  New  York,  1907),  Pt.  I.  vol.  i.  23. 


100  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

franchises.  They  have  likewise  refused  to  imply  exclu- 
siveness  wherever  any  other  reasonable  construction  of  a 
franchise  is  possible,  and  this  even  when  the  municipality 
has  admitted  powers  derived  from  express  statutory  grant.1 
On  the  other  hand,  they  have  not  ventured  to  trust  competi- 
tion as  the  sole  means  of  regulating  public  services.  They 
have  readily  admitted  the  authority  of  the  legislature  (within 
the  bounds  prescribed  by  the  federal  and  state  constitu- 
tions) to  make  reasonable  regulations  as  to  rates  charged 
and  quality  of  service  provided ;  but  they  have  denied  to 
the  municipal  corporation  any  such  right  of  regulation, 
save  when  it  has  been  expressly  delegated  to  the  city  by 
the  legislature  or  when  the  power  to  regulate  has  been  re- 
served in  the  franchise  itself.2 

Condumona.  Surveying  the  powers  and  liabilities  of  the  American  city 
as  a  whole,  and  comparing  them  with  those  attaching  to  the 
cities  of  Europe,  one  need  have  little  hesitation  in  pro- 
nouncing them  both  too  narrow.  In  the  first  half  of  the 
nineteenth  century  broad  grants  of  power  to  municipalities 
were  very  common  but  this  practice  was  in  due  course 
abandoned  and  in  more  recent  years  legal  restrictions  have 
greatly  hampered  the  cities  of  the  United  States  in  the  per- 
formance of  their  logical  functions  of  local  administration. 
Legislatures  and  courts  have  been  at  one  in  their  reluctance 
to  allow  the  municipal  corporation  that  free  scope  which 
it  enjoys  abroad.  This  attitude  of  mistrust  has  had  a 
depressing  effect  upon  city  government,  and  has  undoubtedly 
contributed  to  the  half-heartedness  with  which  municipal 
authorities  too  often  undertake  the  performance  of  their 
duties.  Moreover,  the  policy  of  so  carefully  guarding  the 
municipal  corporation  from  civil  liability  for  the  improper 

1  See  O.  L.  Pond,  Municipal  Control  of  Public  Utilities,  ch.  viii.  ("The 
Power  to  grant  Exclusive  Franchises"). 
1  Ibid.,  ch.  ix. 


MUNICIPAL  POWERS  AND   RESPONSIBILITIES       101 

performance  of  its  public  or  governmental  functions  has  not 
improbably  contributed  to  the  popular  palliation  of  negligence 
and  inefficiency.  In  the  cities  of  France  and  Germany,  where 
an  aggrieved  individual  may  bring  suit  in  the  administrative 
courts,  and  mulct  the  municipal  treasury  for  the  negligence 
or  the  incapacity  of  any  city  officer,  no  matter  what  his  sphere 
of  employment,  the  premium  thus  put  upon  care  and  efficiency 
has  been  a  salutary  factor  in  securing  high  standards  in 
local  administration.  A  wider  range,  both  of  power  and  of 
liability,  seems  to  be  not  the  least  among  the  needs  of  the 
American  city  to-day. 

REFERENCES 

The  most  exhaustive  treatise  on  the  rights  and  duties  of  municipal 
authorities  is  J.  F.  Dillon's  Law  of  Municipal  Corporations  (5th  ed.,  5  vols., 
Boston,  1911),  a  comprehensive,  thorough,  and  accurate  work,  and  a 
worthy  exemplar  of  American  legal  scholarship.  An  equally  invaluable 
commentary  is  Eugene  McQuillin's  Law  of  Municipal  Corporations  (6 
vols.,  Chicago,  1911-1912),  of  which  only  the  earlier  volumes  have  yet 
come  from  the  press.  The  latter  contain  many  historical  discussions. 
In  the  preparation  of  the  foregoing  outline  both  these  works  have  been 
of  great  service.  Many  of  the  leading  cases  referred  to  in  these  treatises 
are  included  in  J.  H.  Beale's  Selection  of  Cases  on  Municipal  Corpora- 
tions (Cambridge,  1911),  and  in  John  E.  Macy's  Selection  of  Cases  on 
Municipal  or  Public  Corporations,  Boston,  1911. 

Special  works  which  will  be  found  valuable  in  their  respective  fields 
are  Eugene  McQuillin's  Law  of  Municipal  Ordinances  (Chicago,  1904), 
and  D.  A.  Jones's  Negligence  of  Municipal  Corporations  (New  York,  1892). 
In  Professor  F.  J.  Goodnow's  Municipal  Home  Rule  (New  York,  1903) 
there  are  some  lucid  discussions  of  municipal  powers  and  liabilities ;  and 
attention  may  also  be  called  to  the  chapter  on  "The  Legal  Position  of 
the  Modern  City"  in  his  Municipal  Government  (New  York,  .1909).  There 
is  a  chapter  on  "The  Legal  Powers  of  the  Municipality"  in  L.  S.  Rowe's 
Problems  of  City  Government  (New  York,  1908) ;  and  O.  L.  Pond's  Mu- 
nicipal Control  of  Public  Utilities  (New  York,  1906)  is  a  brief  but  useful 
study  of  the  attitude  of  American  courts  toward  an  increase  in  the  sphere 
of  municipal  activity.  Some  data  on  the  same  topic  may  be  found  in 
D.  F.  Wilcox's  Municipal  Franchises  (2  vols.,  New  York,  1910) ;  and  there 
is  an  illuminating  chapter  on  "Freedom  of  Incorporation"  in  Simeon  E. 
Baldwin's  Modern  Political  Institutions  (Boston,  1898). 


CHAPTER  V 


Importance 
of  the 
electorate. 


Frequent 
tasks  im- 
posed upon 
the  Ameri- 
can munici- 
pal voter. 


THE  MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE 

FIRST  in  point  of  importance  among  the  active  organs 
of  American  city  government  is  the  electorate  itself,  or, 
in  other  words,  the  body  of  municipal  voters.  The  com- 
position of  this  body  is  of  greater  importance  in  America 
than  it  is  in  European  countries,  because  here  the  electorate 
participates  more  frequently  and  more  directly  in  actual 
government  than  it  does  there.  The  American  municipal 
voter  is  called  to  the  polls  practically  every  year,  whereas 
the  French  voter  casts  his  ballot  at  a  municipal  election  only 
once  in  four  years,  and  most  of  the  voters  in  Prussian  cities 
but  once  in  six  years.  Moreover,  the  American  municipal 
elector,  when  he  goes  to  the  polls,  has  a  larger  task  to  per- 
form. He  is  not,  like  the  voter  in  an  English,  French,  or 
German  city,  asked  to  select  merely  one  name  from  a  list 
of  two  or  three  candidates.  On  the  contrary,  he  is  usually 
called  upon  to  scan  a  ballot  containing  scores  of  names, 
and  to  register  thereon  his  choices  for  a  half-dozen  or 
more  municipal  offices. 

Not  only  is  the  American  municipal  electorate  required 
to  elect  the  officers  of  city  government,  but  wherever  the 
system  of  primary  elections  has  been  adopted  it  is  also 
expected  to  nominate  the  candidates  as  well.  The  voters 
of  the  city  have  thus  a  double  responsibility,  that  of  choos- 
ing the  candidates  and  of  making  final  selections  from  the 
candidates  chosen.  In  the  cities  of  no  other  country  is 
this  dual  function  imposed  upon  the  electorate.  In  France 
and  Germany  the  system  of  ballotage  often  works  out  to 

102 


THE  MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE  103 

something  like  a  primary  and  a  final  election ;  but  in  these 
countries  the  preliminary  election  becomes  final  whenever 
any  one  candidate  gets  a  clear  majority  of  the  polled  votes.1 

Finally,  the  demands  upon  the  American  municipal  The 
electorate  are  heavier  than  those  of  European  cities  because 
the  voters  are  here,  with  much  greater  frequency  than  dens- 
abroad,  called  upon  to  participate  directly  in  the  adminis- 
tration of  city  affairs  by  deciding  questions  submitted  to 
them  on  the  ballot.  The  increased  facilities,  developed  in 
so  many  American  cities  during  the  last  decade,  for  the  use 
of  the  initiative,  the  referendum,  and  the  recall  have  greatly 
augmented  the  voter's  responsibility,  and  have  in  conse- 
quence made  the  composition  of  the  electorate  a  matter  of 
more  vital  importance  than  it  used  to  be.  It  is  true  that 
municipal  voters  in  England  are  sometimes  asked  to  pass 
upon  questions  submitted  to  them  by  referenda;  but  no 
English  city  has  any  provision  for  the  mandatory  initia- 
tive or  the  recall,  nor,  except  in  Switzerland,  have  the  cities 
of  continental  Europe  any  system  of  direct  legislation. 
Their  voters  take  no  direct  part  in  civic  law-making  or 
administration,  but  exert  only  an  indirect  control  through 
their  elected  councillors. 

It  is  because  of  this  more  frequent  and  more  extensive  Popular 
participation,  direct  and  indirect,  of  the  American  voter  toward3 
in  the  government  of  his  city  that  the  problem  of  safe- 
guarding  the  electorate,  both  as  to  its  composition  and  as 
regards  the  normal  influences  which  exert  themselves  upon 
it,  is  of  greater  importance  in  the  United  States  than  it  is 
abroad.  Yet  the  subject  has  not  received  in  America  the 
attention  which  its  importance  warrants.  In  all  the  coun- 
tries of  Europe  questions  relating  to  the  suffrage  have  prob- 
ably had  more  careful  consideration  than  has  been  given 

1  See  the  discussion  of  this  feature  in  Munro's  Government  of  Euro- 
pean Cities  (New  York,  1909),  25-35,  140-145. 


104  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

to  them  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic.  Taking  manhood 
suffrage  as  an  unalterable  feature  of  the  political  system, 
reforming  movements  in  America  have  been  disposed  to 
concentrate  their  chief  attention  upon  the  instruments  with 
which  the  electorate  performs  its  work  rather  than  upon 
the  make-up  of  the  voters'  lists.  The  public  temper  has  not 
been  at  all  tolerant  of  proposals  to  put  any  important 
limitations  upon  the  policy  of  manhood  suffrage.  The 
suggestion  of  a  property  qualification  for  voting  would  not 
get  a  serious  hearing  in  any  American  city.  Nor,  indeed, 
would  such  a  suggestion  seem  to  merit  any  consideration, 
in  view  of  the  fact  that  even  a  nominal  property-holding 
qualification  would  probably  disfranchise  a  majority  of  the 
present  manhood-suffrage  voters.  In  a  previous  chapter 
attention  has  been  drawn  to  the  small  percentage  of  home- 
owning  heads  of  families  in  cities  like  Boston  and  New  York ; 
and  from  these  figures  some  idea  can  be  gathered  as  to  the 
havoc  which  the  imposition  of  any  form  of  real-property 
test  would  work  upon  the  present  composition  of  the  elec- 
torate.1 It  ought  to  be  pointed  out,  moreover,  that  such  a 
test  for  voting  does  not  now  exist  in  any  of  the  chief  Euro- 
pean cities.  What  appears  at  first  glance  to  be  a  property 
qualification  is  merely  a  requirement  that  citizens,  in  order 
to  be  voters,  shall  either  occupy  tax-paying  property  or 
pay  a  certain  minimum  in  annual  taxes  into  the  public 
treasury. 

Histoiyof         In  the  earlier  stages  of  American  political  development, 

in  America,    it  is  true,  property  qualifications  for  voting  were  practically 

universal.     In  none  of  the  colonies  was  manhood  suffrage 

the  rule.     Nor  was  it  established  as  an  immediate  result 

of    the    Revolution.     The    Declaration    of    Independence 

asserted  the  inalienable  natural  right  of  all  men  to  a  voice 

in  the  conduct  of  their  governmental  affairs ;   but  not  even 

1  See  above,  pp.  47-48. 


THE  MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE  105 

after  they  had  achieved  their  autonomy  did  the  states 
hasten  to  make  provision  for  a  government  which  would 
depend  for  its  continuance  upon  the  consent  of  all  the 
governed.  With  the  adoption  of  the  federal  constitution, 
however,  a  reaction  against  property  tests  began,  and  the 
movement  received  some  impetus  from  the  plausible  dog- 
matism of  the  French  Revolution,  which  had  its  echoes  in 
America.  Then,  in  the  first  three  or  four  decades  of  the 
nineteenth  century  came  the  fiercer  competition  of  politi- 
cal parties  and  the  inevitable  reaching  out  for  new  voters.1 
One  by  one  the  states  abolished  both  property  and  tax 
requirements,  which  had,  however,  even  before  they  were 
given  up,  remained  in  many  cases  unenforced.  The  crest 
of  the  abolition  wave  came  during  the  period  1820-1845.2 
In  this  interval  New  York,  Massachusetts,  Connecticut, 
New  Jersey,  Tennessee,  and  Delaware  threw  property 
qualifications  overboard ;  and  when  new  territories  were 
formed  their  assemblies  were  usually  left  to  fix  the  standing 
qualifications  for  voting.  As  they  almost  invariably  adopted 
the  policy  of  manhood  suffrage  from  the  outset,  and  as  no 
change  took  place  when  the  territories  were  admitted  to 
statehood,  the  widening  of  the  suffrage  thus  went  hand  in 
hand  with  the  expansion  of  membership  in  the  Union. 
By  1850  it  had  established  itself  as  the  dominant  practice. 

It  is  approximately  correct  to  say  that  in  an  American  Present 
city  every  adult  male  citizen  is  entitled  to  vote  at  munici-  tionsfor" 
pal    elections.     It  is  not  strictly  true,  however;   for  there 
are  many  departures  from  the  rule,  by  reason  of  the  fact  cities, 
that  the  laws  relating  to  qualifications  for  voting  are  made 
by  the  several  states,  which,  subject  to  certain  limitations 

1  A  good  account  of  this  movement  is  given  in  Professor  F.  W.  Black- 
mar's  article  on  "The  History  of  Suffrage  in  Legislation  in  the  United 
States,"  in  the  Chatauquan,  XXII.  28-34  (October,  1895). 

2  See  above,  pp.  1 1-12. 


106  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

imposed  by  the  federal  constitution,  are  free  to  establish 
such  requirements  as  they  choose.  As  they  have,  for  the 
most  part,  made  rules  that  do  not  differ  widely,  variations 
in  the  texture  of  the  electorate,  even  though  they  are  more 
numerous  than  is  commonly  realized,  are  not  of  great  im- 
portance. In  all  but  three  of  the  states  qualifications  for 
voting  are  the  same  at  the  regular  state  and  city  elections,1 
a  feature  that  distinguishes  the  American  from  the  English 
and  German  electoral  systems.  In  some  states,  as  in 
Massachusetts,  there  are  special  laws  by  which  the 
suffrage  on  school  matters  is  wider  than  on  ordinary  state 
and  municipal  issues.  In  other  states  the  right  to  vote  at 
special  elections  called  to  decide  certain  questions,  such  as 
the  authorizing  of  municipal  loans,  is  restricted  to  property 
taxpayers.  In  general,  however,  all  those  who  are  qualified 
to  vote  at  state  elections  have  the  same  right  at  the  mu- 
nicipal pollings,  and  the  same  voters'  lists  are  almost  always 
used  at  the  two  elections. 

1.  Age.  Without  exception,  all  the  states  have  adopted  the  old 

English  rule  fixing  twenty-one  years  as  the  age  of  polit- 
ical majority.  As  the  enrolment  of  voters  takes  place 
some  time  before  the  annual  elections,  however,  it  is  usually 
provided  that  a  person  otherwise  qualified  may  have  his 
name  put  upon  the  voters'  list  before  reaching  his  twenty- 
first  birthday  if  the  election  comes  shortly  after  that  .date. 

2.  Citizen-        In  the  minds  of  most  people  voting  rights  are  inseparably 

associated  with  citizenship.  In  practice  the  two  do  usually 
go  together,  but  this  association  is  not  at  all  necessary. 
There  are  thousands  of  American  voters  who  are  not  citi- 

1  The  exceptions  are  Rhode  Island  (see  p.  114,  below),  Kansas,  where 
female  suffrage  exists  in  municipal  but  not  in  state  elections ;  and 
New  York,  where  women  are  not  permitted  to  vote  at  state  elections, 
but  are,  if  they  own  property  and  are  otherwise  qualified,  allowed  to 
have  a  voice  in  town  and  village  elections  upon  questions  involving  local 
taxation. 


THE  MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE  107 

zens,  and  there  are  many  more  thousands  of  American 
citizens  who  are  not  voters.  This  is  because  the  laws 
governing  citizenship  are  made  by  one  authority,  and  those 
relating  to  suffrage  qualifications  by  forty-eight  other 
authorities.  Citizenship  is  a  matter  of  federal  jurisdiction : 
Congress  alone  decides  who  are  American  citizens  and  who 
are  not.  Congress  likewise  establishes  the  rules  under 
which  aliens  may  become  citizens,  and  provides  the  ma- 
chinery for  admitting  to  citizenship.  Voting  rights,  on  the 
other  hand,  come  within  the  sphere  of  state  jurisdiction. 
Each  state  determines  who  shall  vote,  not  only  at  its  own 
state  and  municipal  elections,  but  at  presidential  and  con- 
gressional elections  as  well.  In  this  matter  each  state  has 
entire  discretion,  subject,  of  course,  to  the  well-known 
general  restrictions  contained  in  the  constitution  of  the 
United  States.1  These  limitations  do  not  preclude  a  state 
from  giving  the  franchise  to  non-citizens ;  and  nine  states 
allow  non-citizens  to  vote.  Alabama,  Arkansas,  Kansas, 
Indiana,  Missouri,  Nebraska,  Oregon,  South  Dakota,  and 
Texas  require  only  that  an  alien  shall,  in  due  form  and  at 
a  fixed  date  preceding  the  election,  have  declared  his  in- 
tention to  become  a  citizen.2 

Under  the  provisions  of  the  existing  federal  laws  relating  The  ac- 
to  citizenship  by  naturalization,  the  formal  "declaration  of  Of  citizen- 
intention"  may  be  made  by  any  alien  who  is  "a  white 
person,  or  of  African  nativity  or  of  African  descent,"  before  tion- 
any  federal  court  or  any  court  of  record  having  jurisdic- 
tion over  the  place  in  which  he  lives.      Such  declaration 
may  not  be  filed,  however,  until  the  alien  has  reached  the 
age  of  eighteen  years.     The  declaration  must  contain  in- 

1  Art.  xiv.  §  2,  and  art.  xv. 

1  Two  other  states,  Michigan  and  Wisconsin,  allow  voting  rights  to 
those  aliens,  otherwise  qualified,  who  before  November  8, 1894,  and  Decem- 
ber 1,  1908  respectively,  declared  their  intention  to  become  citizens. 


108  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

formation  as  to  the  applicant's  name,  age,  parentage,  occu- 
pation, country  of  origin,  and  time  and  place  of  arrival  in 
the  United  States ;  and  it  must  further  announce  his  inten- 
tion to  become  a  citizen,  and  thereby  to  divest  himself  of 
all  allegiance  to  any  foreign  sovereign.1  A  copy  of  this 
declaration,  under  the  seal  of  the  court,  is  given  to  the  alien, 
and  must  be  presented  by  him  when  he  applies  for  final 
naturalization. 

Procedure  Not  less  than  two  years  after  an  alien  has  filed  his  dec- 
•ation.  laration  of  intention,  and  after  not  less  than  five  years' 
continuous  residence  in  the  United  States,  he  may  file  a 
petition  for  letters  of  full  citizenship  in  any  one  of  the 
various  courts  designated  by  law  as  having  authority  over 
naturalization  matters,  provided  that  he  has  lived  within 
the  jurisdiction  of  this  court  at  least  one  year  immediately 
preceding  the  filing  of  his  petition.  The  petition  must  be 
signed  by  the  applicant  himself,  and  must  give  full  answers 
to  a  set  of  prescribed  questions.  If  the  alien  has  arrived 
in  the  United  States  since  June  29,  1906,  his  petition  must 
be  accompanied  by  a  document  from  the  United  States 
immigration  authorities  certifying  the  time  and  place  of 
his  arrival.  In  addition,  he  must,  when  he  files  his  ap- 
plication, bring  forward  the  sworn  statements  of  two  wit- 
nesses (both  of  whom  must  be  citizens  of  the  United 
States)  in  personal  testimony  to  his  five  years'  continuous 
residence  and  his  moral  character,  and  in  substantiation 
of  the  other  claims  made  in  his  petition.  After  this  paper 
has  been  left  with  the  clerk  of  the  court  it  must  lie  on  file 
for  at  least  ninety  days,  during  which  notice  of  its  filing 
is  posted.  In  this  interval,  also,  an  investigation  of  the 
petitioner's  claims  is  undertaken  by  one  of  the  federal 

1  Citizenship  may  be  acquired,  without  formal  declaration  of  inten- 
tion, by  aliens  who  have  served  a  certain  term  in  the  United  States  army 
or  navy  and  have  been  honorably  discharged. 


THE   MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE  109 

agents  maintained  for  the  purpose.  All  these  formalities 
having  been  attended  to,  the  court  sets  a  date  for  a  hearing 
upon  the  petition.  This  hearing,  which  must  be  public, 
cannot  take  place  within  thirty  days  preceding  a  regular 
election.  Both  witnesses  must  attend  the  hearing  with 
the  applicant,  and  must  answer  such  questions  as  may  be 
put  to  them  by  the  presiding  judge,  who  may  also  demand 
from  the  applicant  assurance  that  he  is  not  affiliated  with 
any  organization  teaching  disbelief  in  organized  government, 
and  that  he  is  attached  to  the  principles  embodied  in  the 
constitution  of  the  United  States.  If  the  court  is  satisfied 
upon  these  various  points,  the  clerk  will  issue  letters  of 
citizenship,  or  final  papers,  as  they  are  more  commonly 
called ;  and  this  issuance  is  made  a  matter  of  permanent 
court  record. 

These  strict  rules  concerning  naturalization  procedure  Naturaiiza- 
are  the  outcome  of  an  attempt  to  put  an  end  to  various 
abuses  that  existed  under  previous  naturalization  arrange- 
ments. Prior  to  1906,  when  the  process  of  naturalization 
was  simpler  and  easier,  fraudulent  admission  to  citizenship 
was  all  too  common.  Sometimes  an  alien  got  himself  en- 
rolled upon  the  voters'  list  by  means  of  forged  papers; 
and,  since  there  were  so  many  courts  with  authority  to 
grant  these  papers,  the  detection  of  forgeries  was  not  easy. 
More  often  crowds  of  aliens  were  admitted  to  citizenship 
during  the  days  preceding  an  election,  when  no  careful 
investigation  of  their  statements  was  possible.  Paid  wit- 
nesses were  sometimes  provided  by  party  managers  to 
take  oath  as  to  matters  which  they  knew  nothing  about. 
Not  uncommonly  the  same  witnesses  appeared  for  a  dozen 
or  more  aliens.  In  fact,  the  naturalization  of  foreign- 
ers became  one  of  the  regular  undertakings  of  the  ward 
organization :  the  applicant's  petition  was  made  out  for 
him,  his  witnesses  were  supplied,  and  in  many  cases  he  was 


110  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

merely  a  participant  in  procedure  which  he  did  not  under- 
stand. The  handling  of  fifty  or  sixty  naturalizations  per 
hour  was  not  a  rare  achievement  in  New  York  courts  before 
the  stricter  rules  went  into  force.  Under  such  pressure 
during  the  days  preceding  the  registration  of  voters  all 
careful  scrutiny  of  petitions  was  out  of  the  question;  and 
the  voters'  lists  of  the  larger  cities  were  regularly  padded 
with  the  names  of  persons  who  had  not  fulfilled  the  stated 
qualifications  for  admission  to  citizenship.  Since  1906 
these  abuses  have  been  almost  wholly  eliminated.  The 
requirement  that  the  applicant  shall  produce  an  immi- 
gration certificate,  that  his  petition  shall  lie  on  file  for  ninety 
days,  and  that  there  shall  be  no  court  hearing  on  naturali- 
zation matters  within  thirty  days  of  a  regular  election  has 
reduced  fraudulent  practices  to  a  minimum. 

The  chief  Although  naturalization  abuses  were  chiefly  the  result  of 
tTftiudu-  overzeal  on  the  part  of  political  agents,  they  were  never- 
izationtural"  ^heless  mspired  to  some  extent  by  those  rules  which  in  many 
cities  forbid  the  employment  of  unnaturalized  aliens  in  the 
city's  working  force.  The  city  is  everywhere  a  large  em- 
ployer of  unskilled  labor  in  its  streets,  sewer,  water,  and 
public-works  departments.  The  daily  pay  is  good,  and  the 
newcomer  chafes  under  the  regulations  which  prevent  him 
from  getting  a  place  on  the  municipal  pay-roll.  He  wants 
to  become  a  citizen  as  soon  as  he  can,  not  in  order  that  he 
may  get  the  franchise  for  its  own  sake,  but  that  he  may  be 
eligible  for  employment  in  public  undertakings.  He  finds, 
moreover,  that  local  politicians  develop  a  much  greater 
interest  in  the  welfare  of  those  among  his  compatriots 
who  have  become  naturalized  and  have  acquired  the  right 
to  vote.  Very  naturally  he  comes  to  regard  citizenship  as 
something  which  has  economic  as  well  as  political  utility. 
The  pressure  put  upon  him  becomes  correspondingly  great, 
and  the  temptation  to  apply  for  citizenship  before  he  has 


THE  MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE  111 

fulfilled  all  the  requirements  has  too  often  proved  irresist- 
ible, especially  when  the  way  to  fraud  has  been  smoothed  by 
assurances  from  some  ward  politician.1 

In  addition  to  citizenship,  a  certain  minimum  of  local  3.  Red- 
residence  is  invariably  required.  The  term  varies  in  length 
from  state  to  state,  the  requirement  providing  for  a  cer- 
tain period  of  residence  within  the  state  and  a  shorter  one 
within  the  city.  In  Massachusetts  the  law  demands  a 
year's  domicil  in  the  state  and  six  months  in  the  city; 
in  Pennsylvania,  a  year  in  the  state  and  two  months  in  the 
city ;  in  Michigan,  six  months  in  the  state,  with  no  definite 
term  of  residence  in  the  city.2  It  should  be  understood, 
however,  that  the  requirement  refers  to  legal  residence, 
which  is  not  the  same  thing  as  actual  habitation.  Ordi- 
narily the  two  are  the  same;  but  it  is  quite  possible  for 
a  man  to  live  in  one  state  or  community  and  still  have  his 
legal  residence  in  another.  It  is  commonly  remarked  that  The 
a  man's  legal  residence  is  where  he  says  it  is,  provided,  of  ^e^g^» 
course,  that  he  does  not  claim  legal  residence  in  more  than  residence> 
one  jurisdiction  at  the  same  time.  What  constitutes  resi- 
dence for  purposes  of  fulfilling  the  suffrage  requirements  is 
a  matter  for  the  laws  and  the  judicial  decisions  of  each  state 
to  decide ;  but  in  the  main  the  animus  manendi  —  in  other 
words,  the  individual's  own  intent  to  be  domiciled  in  a 
particular  jurisdiction  —  is  the  determining  factor. 

The    question    is    badly    complicated,  however,  by   the 

1  "I  was  long  ago  taken  to  watch  the  process  of  citizen-making  in  New 
York.     Droves  of  squalid  men,  who  looked  as  if  they  had  just  emerged 
from  an  emigrant  ship,  and  had  perhaps  done  so  only  a  few  weeks  before, 
for  the  law  prescribing  a  certain  term  of  residence  is  frequently  violated, 
were  brought  up  to  a  magistrate  by  the  ward  agent  of  the  party  which 
had  captured  them,  declared  their  allegiance  to  the  United  States,  and 
were  forthwith  placed  on  the  roll."  —  JAMES  BRYCE,  American  Common- 
wealth (2  vols.,  New  York,  1910),  II.  103. 

2  The  exact  requirements  in  the  various  states,  revised  annually,  may 
be  found  in  the  Statesman's  Year  Book,  or  in  the  World  Almanac. 


112 


GOVERNMENT   OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Legal  resi- 
dence and 
taxation. 


4.  Educa- 
tional 
qualifica- 
tions. 


common  American  practice  of  permitting  a  man's  legal 
residence  to  determine  where  he  shall  be  assessed  for  per- 
sonal property,  income,  and  poll-taxes.  In  fact,  the  choice 
of  a  legal  residence  —  for  in  many  cases  it  has  become  a 
matter  of  individual  discretion  —  is  very  often  determined  by 
a  person's  desire  to  be  assessed  in  one  state  or  municipality 
rather  than  another,  a  desire  not  always  wholly  unconnected 
with  the  severity  or  leniency  of  the  local  assessors.  In 
the  last  resort,  the  question  of  a  man's  legal  residence  is  a 
matter  for  judicial  decision,  and  must  be  determined  from  the 
facts  in  each  particular  case ;  but  as  a  matter  of  everyday 
practice  the  sworn  statement  of  the  individual  is  usually 
taken  as  conclusive  both  by  tax-assessors  and  by  registrars 
of  voters.1  Some  of  the  evils  to  which  this  divorce  of  legal 
from  physical  domicil  has  given  rise  are  mentioned  later; 
in  this  place  it  is  enough  merely  to  lay  stress  upon  the 
point  that  the  fiction  rather  than  the  fact  of  residence  is 
what  law  and  practice  often  exact. 

In  nearly  one-third  of  all  the  states  some  sort  of  educa- 
tional test  for  voting  is  established  by  law.  Connecticut, 
which  requires  that  every  one  enrolled  as  a  voter  shall  be 
able  to  read  the  state  constitution  or  statutes  in  the  Eng- 
lish language,  is  the  only  state  which  allows  no  exemptions 
whatever.  California,  Delaware,  Maine,  Massachusetts, 
Washington,  and  Wyoming  require  that  voters  shall  be  able 
either  to  read  or  to  write  or  to  do  both;  but  all  grant 
exemptions  of  one  sort  or  another.  These  exemptions, 
which  apply  mainly  to  persons  physically  incapacitated 
or  of  advanced  age,  are  not  designed  to  permit  racial  or 

1  The  general  principles  followed  by  the  courts  in  determining  whether 
or  not  a  person  has  "established  a  legal  residence"  are  discussed  in  Wil- 
liams v.  Whiting  (11  Mass.  424),  which  has  become  a  leading  case  upon 
the  point.  For  a  comprehensive  consideration  of  the  law  and  practice, 
see  G.  W.  McCrary's  Treatise  on  the  American  Law  of  Elections  (4th  ed., 
Chicago,  1897),  ch.  iv. 


THE   MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE  113 

other  discriminations,  but  merely  to  keep  the  strict  applica- 
tion of  the  tests  from  resulting  in  hardship.  Several  South- 
ern states,  on  the  other  hand,  while  prescribing  educational 
tests,  grant  exemptions  to  whole  classes  of  voters,  for  the 
express  purpose  of  excluding  colored  citizens  from  the 
franchise  privileges  guaranteed  to  them  by  the  fifteenth 
amendment  to  the  federal  constitution.1  Inasmuch  as  the 
percentage  of  illiterates  among  negroes  is  very  large,  the 
requirement  that  voters  shall  be  able  to  read  or  write  is  one 
which,  when  strictly  administered,  shuts  out  a  large  propor- 
tion of  them.  But  there  are  also  many  illiterate  white  Administra- 
citizens  who  would  be  excluded  by  the  test;  and  for  their  educational 
benefit  Alabama,  Louisiana,  Mississippi,  North  and  South  *"1  the 
Carolina,  and  Virginia  have  provided  means  whereby  the 
requirement  can  be  easily  circumvented  by  the  white  element 
of  the  population.  Various  devices  are  employed  to  this  end. 
In  one  case  the  provision  is  that  the  voter  must  either  read 
the  constitution  or  "  give  a  reasonable  interpretation 
thereof,"  the  question  whether  the  interpretation  is  reason- 
able or  not  resting  with  the  white  officials  in  charge  of  the 
registration.2  In  another  state  the  so-termed  "grandfather 
clause"  relieves  from  the  necessity  of  passing  the  educational 
test  all  those  who  enjoyed  voting  rights  before  1867  and  all 
descendants  of  such  voters,  which  is  a  way  of  giving  complete 
exemption  to  all  native-born  white  citizens.3  Still  another 
of  the  Southern  states  exempts  all  owners  of  property  who 
have  paid  the  taxes  assessed  for  the  year  preceding  enrol- 
ment. As  the  percentage  of  property-owning  negroes  is 
small  in  all  the  Southern  cities,  and  the  proportion  of  those 
who  pay  their  taxes  on  time  even  smaller,  it  follows  that 

1G.  T.  Stephenson's  Race  Distinctions  in  American  Law  (New  York, 
1910)  contains  a  full  discussion  of  this  matter. 
1  Constitution  of  Mississippi,  1890,  art.  xii.  §  244. 
3  Constitution  of  Louisiana,  1898,  art.  cxcvii.  §§  3-5. 


114  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

not  many  illiterates  get  their  names  upon  the  rolls  by  the 
use  of  this  exemption.1  It  requires  little  argument,  accord- 
ingly, to  prove  that  the  educational  tests  imposed  by  various 
states  in  the  South  are  designed,  not  so  much  to  purge  the 
voters'  lists  of  illiterates  as  to  permit  racial  discriminations 
to  be  made  without  violating  the  letter  of  the  federal  consti- 
tution. That  they  have  done  this  effectively  is  proved  by 
the  estimate,  based  upon  careful  study,  that  in  some  of  the 
Southern  states  not  more  than  one  adult  male  negro  out 
of  every  hundred  votes,  even  at  presidential  elections.2 
6.  Owner-  No  state  of  the  Union  now  requires  either  the  ownership 
property.  or  the  occupancy  of  property  as  a  condition  of  enrolment 
for  state  elections;  and  only  one  state,  Rhode  Island, 
makes  any  such  requirement  for  voting  at  municipal  elec- 
tions. In  Rhode  Island  the  right  to  vote  for  city  councillors, 
or  on  matters  of  municipal  finance,  is  restricted  to  those 
who  own  property  to  the  assessed  value  of  $134,  or  who  pay 
a  rental  amounting  to  at  least  seven  dollars  per  year.  In 
actual  operation  this  restriction  does  not  exclude  many  who 
would  be  enrolled  under  a  system  of  manhood  suffrage. 
Indeed,  it  may  be  doubted  whether  the  requirement,  how- 
ever wise  it  may  have  been  when  established  in  1842,  serves 
any  useful  purpose  nowadays. 

e.  Payment  Some  other  states  —  Pennsylvania  and  Tennessee,  for 
example  —  require  that  voters  shall  have  paid  their  poll  or 
state  taxes  before  being  enrolled.  Others,  like  Massachu- 
setts, require  only  that  no  names  be  put  on  the  list  save 
those  of  persons  who  have  been  assessed  for  poll-taxes. 

1  Constitution  of  South  Carolina,  1895,  art.  ii.  §  4.  For  a  further  dis- 
cussion of  these  matters,  see  J.  B.  Phillips,  Educational  Qualifications  of 
Voters  (University  of  Colorado  Studies,  III.  No.  3) ;  and,  for  a  defence 
of  the  policy  pursued  by  the  Southern  states,  see  F.  G.  Gaffey's  article  on 
"Suffrage  Limitations  at  the  South,"  in  Political  Science  Quarterly,  XX. 
1-15  (March,  1905). 

*  J.  C.  Rose,  "  Negro  Suffrage,"  in  American  Political  Science  Review, 
I.  20  (November,  1906). 


THE  MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE  115 

When  the  rule  that  poll-taxes  must  be  paid  is  rigidly  enforced, 
the  payment  of  them  for  delinquents  virtually  becomes  a 
charge  upon  the  campaign  funds  of  the  political  parties. 
The  number  of  voters  who  will  leave  their  poll-taxes  unpaid 
in  the  expectation  that  party  agents  will  provide  the  money 
on  the  eve  of  the  election  is  larger  in  every  community  than 
popular  professions  of  civic  patriotism  would  lead  one  to 
suppose.  To  provide  that  a  voter  must  be  assessed  for 
poll-taxes  is  quite  different  from  providing  that  he  must 
have  paid  them.  The  former  requirement  shuts  out  nobody ; 
the  latter,  were  it  not  for  the  readiness  of  party  leaders  to 
pay  delinquent  taxes,  would  exclude  a  considerable  propor- 
tion of  the  present  electors.  In  Boston  not  more  than  fifty 
per  cent  of  those  assessed  for  poll-taxes  ever  pay  them. 
Indeed,  if  we  leave  out  of  account  those  whose  poll-taxes 
are  put  on  their  property-tax  bills,  and  who  therefore  cannot 
evade  payment,  we  find  that  in  Boston  not  more  than  ten 
per  cent  of  assessed  polls  are  ever  collected.  The  experience 
of  other  cities  is  doubtless  the  same.  Of  all  species  of  tax- 
dodging  this  is  the  most  prevalent  and  the  least  defensible. 

In  every  state  there  are  certain  disqualifications  from 
voting;  but  within  every  category  of  the  ineligible  are 
included  persons  convicted  of  treason  or  other  felonies,  and 
those  who  are  insane  or  under  guardianship.  In  a  few  states 
the  exclusion  extends  to  all  persons  in  receipt  of  public 
poor-relief,  and  to  United  States  soldiers  and  sailors. 
New  York  has  provided  by  special  statute  that  the  dis- 
qualification shall  not  extend  to  convicts  in  the  House  of 
Refuge  or  the  State  Reformatory.  A  few  states  also  pro- 
vide for  the  disfranchisement  of  persons  who  have  been 
convicted  of  bribery  at  elections.  Even  when  rigidly 
enforced,  these  various  disqualifications  do  not  exclude 
many  who  would  otherwise  be  entitled  to  vote. 

The  methods  of  compiling  and  revising  the   voters'  lists 


116  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

Methods  of  are  not  radically  different  in  the  various  American  cities. 
^c?1jSng  When  the  right  to  vote  is  wholly  divorced  from  tax-paying, 
voter*1  lists.  ^  kecomes  impossible  to  use  anything  akin  to  the  English 
and  German  methods  of  compiling  the  voters'  lists  from  the 
tax-rolls.  Manhood  suffrage  necessitates  some  system  of 
special  registration  of  voters.  In  Massachusetts  a  voter's 
name  is  put  upon  the  rolls  by  the  assessors,  without  any 
initiative  on  his  part.  During  the  first  week  of  April  in 
each  year  the  municipal  assessors  proceed  to  make  up  their 
lists  of  taxable  property.  On  these  lists  they  enter  the  names 
not  only  of  all  persons  who  have  real  or  personal  property 
subject  to  taxation,  but  also  the  names  of  those  who  are 
liable  to  the  payment  of  poll-taxes.  The  names  in  this  latter 
category  are  supposed  to  be  obtained  by  house-to-house  work 
on  the  part  of  the  assessors  or  their  assistants.  When  the 
assessors  turn  in  their  rolls,  the  voters'  lists  are  compiled 
from  them. 

Defects  of  As  a  system  of  enrolling  voters  this  procedure  has  proved 
system?*108  far  from  satisfactory.  Since  the  assessors  are  usually  men 
who  have  been  appointed  to  their  posts  for  political  reasons, 
they  naturally  show  more  zeal  than  fairness  in  their  work, 
sometimes,  it  is  to  be  feared,  taking  pains  to  put  on  the  list 
the  names  of  their  fellow-partisans  and  to  leave  off  those  of 
their  political  opponents.  The  work  is  done  so  carelessly 
that  the  lists  are  usually  prolific  in  errors  and  much  revision 
of  them  becomes  necessary.  Because  of  these  shortcomings 
the  task  of  enrolling  voters  has  in  Boston  been  taken  from 
the  assessors  and  given  to  the  police.  During  the  first  week 
in  April  members  of  the  police  force  visit  every  house  in 
the  city  and  obtain  the  names  of  all  qualified  voters ;  and 
the  lists  which  these  officers  turn  in  are  made  the  basis  of 
the  electoral  rolls. 

The  work          No  matter  how  well  this  preliminary  work  of  enrolment 
of  voters  may  be  done  by  the  assessors  or  the  police  or  any 


THE   MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE  117 

other  set  of  officers,  a  good  deal  of  revision  is  necessary. 
Some  voters  will  be  overlooked;  others  will  be  put  on  the 
lists  who  ought  not  to  be  there.  In  every  Massachusetts  city, 
therefore,  there  is  a  revising  body,  or  board  of  registrars,  who 
have  this  task  of  revision  in  charge.  Such  a  board  is  made 
up  of  three  or  more  members  appointed  by  the  mayor, 
subject  to  the  usual  rules  governing  the  confirmation  of  the 
mayor's  appointments.  For  many  years  it  has  been  required 
by  law  that  both  political  parties  shall  be  represented  on  it, 
the  principle  of  bi-partisanship  receiving  wider  recognition 
in  the  composition  of  this  board  than  in  that  of  any  other 
municipal  body,  for  the  reason  that  the  duties  of  registrars 
are  regarded  as  unavoidably  political  in  nature.  Registrars 
are  usually  appointed  for  terms  of  three  years,  and  one  or 
more  of  them  retire  annually.  In  most  cases  they  are  paid, 
by  annual  salary  in  the  larger  cities  and  by  a  per  diem  allow- 
ance in  the  smaller. 

In  most  of  the  states  other  than  Massachusetts  a  different  The  ma- 
plan  is  pursued.  The  lists  are  not  compiled  from  the  asses-  registration 
sors'  rolls  but  are  made  up  entirely  by  the  registrars.  These 
registrars,  who  are  appointed  in  different  ways  (in  New  York 
by  the  mayor,  in  Philadelphia  by  the  governor,  and  in  Chi- 
cago by  the  county  judge),  hold  sessions  a  short  time  before 
each  election.  The  applicant  for  enrolment  appearing  be- 
fore the  board,  is  put  under  oath,  and  is  then  questioned 
concerning  his  age,  his  citizenship,  and  his  length  of  resi- 
dence in  the  state  and  the  city ;  if  there  is  an  educational 
test  for  voting,  he  is  also  subjected  to  this ;  if  he  is  under 
the  law  which  requires  voters  to  have  been  assessed  for 
poll-taxes,  he  must  present  evidence  of  such  assessment. 
All  these  statements  are  recorded  by  the  registrars,  who 
then  either  give  or  refuse  to  the  applicant  a  place  on  the 
voters'  list  as  a  majority  of  them  may  decide.  In  New 
York  the  registrars  enter  upon  their  books  a  description 


118  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

of  the  voter's  personal  appearance,  in  order  that  he 
may  be  identified  in  case  another  man  should  attempt  to 
vote  in  his  name.  If  the  board  were  to  scrutinize  care- 
fully the  statements  of  every  applicant  for  enrolment,  and 
were  to  verify  the  alleged  residence  of  each  one  by  send- 
ing an  officer  on  a  personal  visit  to  the  address  given, 
the  results  obtained  would  of  course  be  more  satisfactory. 
As  there  is  neither  time  nor  appropriation  for  all  this, 
however,  the  lists  invariably  contain  names  which  ought 
not  to  be  upon  them ;  and  instances  of  "colonization" — that 
is,  of  the  enrolment  of  voters  from  fictitious  residences  — 
are  not  at  all  rare,  although  they  are  not  so  common  as 
they  were  a  decade  ago. 

Suggested  There  seems  still  to  be  much  room  for  improvement  in 
mental  the  machinery  usually  provided  for  the  enrolment  of  voters 
in  American  cities.  In  some  states  the  list  is  made  up  anew 
each  year,  and  it  becomes  necessary  for  every  voter  to  appear 
annually  before  the  board  of  registrars.  This  is  something 
of  a  burden,  and  often  results  in  the  disfranchisement  of 
many  who  forget  to  have  their  enrolment  renewed.  In  a 
few  states,  as  in  Massachusetts  and  Pennsylvania,  the 
practice  is  to  keep  a  voter's  name  upon  the  list  so  long  as  he 
remains  assessed  for  poll  or  other  taxes,  thus  obviating  the 
necessity  of  his  making  a  new  registration  each  year.  This 
plan  seems,  on  the  whole,  to  be  the  more  satisfactory  of 
the  two,  although  in  all  large  cities,  owing  to  frequent 
shifts  in  the  residences  of  voters,  a  great  many  changes  in 
the  lists  become  necessary  from  year  to  year.  If  boards  of 
registration,  moreover,  were  supplied  with  such  clerical  a^ 
sistance  as  would  enable  them  to  take  the  same  care  whh 
banks,  trust  companies,  and  other  private  organizatior 
exercise  in  safeguarding  themselves  against  imposture,  t,  c 
voting-lists  could  be  purged  of  perennial  frauds.  When  lists 
are  padded  with  fraudulent  names,  it  is  not  usually  because 


THE  MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE  119 

the  registrars  have  been  privy  to  political  malpractice  or 
have  connived  at  the  trickery  of  ward  politicians ;  it  is 
almost  always  because  they  have  too  much  work  to  do 
properly.  So  many  voters  have  to  be  enrolled  in  a  few 
days  that  only  the  most  perfunctory  scrutiny  of  appli- 
cants is  within  the  bounds  of  physical  possibility. 

In  some  states  matters  are  made  worse  by  the  practice 
of  permitting  those  whose  names  are  not  on  the  voters'  lists 
to  "swear  in"  their  votes  on  election  day,  in  other  words  to 
make  oath  at  the  poll  that  they  are  duly  qualified  voters. 
Such  persons  are  allowed  to  vote  forthwith  although  there 
is  obviously  no  way  of  verifying  the  sworn  statements  which 
they  have  made. 

Whether  the  prevailing  tone  of  present-day  municipal  Theexten- 
politics  might  not  be  further  improved  by  the  imposition  Educational 
of  more  rigid  qualifications  for  voting  is  a  fair,  if  a  difficult,  te8tet 
question.  The  requirement  that  voters  shall  be  able  to 
read  and  write  can  scarcely  be  called  illogical  or  unjust  in 
states  which  maintain  at  the  public  expense  systems  of 
universal  and  compulsory  education.  The  census  of  1900 
showed  that  there  were  in  the  United  States  nearly  two  and 
a  half  million  illiterate  men  of  voting  age,  or  about  eleven 
per  cent  of  the  total  adult  male  population.  A  considerable 
proportion  of  this  illiterate  element  is  concentrated  in  the 
negro  population  of  the  Southern  states ;  but  even  in  North- 
ern cities  the  percentage  of  those  who  cannot  read  and  write 
is  too  large  to  be  disregarded.  In  the  state  of  New  York, 
for  example,  in  cities  of  over  25,000  population,  about  six 
per  cent  of  the  adult  male  population  was  designated  as 
illiterate;  in  the  cities  of  New  Hampshire  the  figure  was 
above  ten  per  cent.1  The  ratio  of  illiteracy  is  large  in  the 

1  C.  W.  Dabney,  ."The  Illiteracy  of  the  Voting  Population  in  the 
United  States,"  in  Annual  Report  of  the  United  States  Commissioner  of 
Education,  1902,  pp.  789-818. 


120  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

cities  because  of  the  foreign  elements  massed  there.  Now, 
it  is  a  commonplace  of  practical  politics  that  the  voter  who  is 
unable  to  read  his  ballot  becomes  an  easy  prey  to  political 
manipulators.  His  only  alternatives  are,  as  a  rule,  either 
to  vote  a  straight  ticket  or  to  spoil  his  ballot.  It  may  well 
be  asked,  then,  whether  a  policy  of  political  prudence  should 
permit  one  vote  in  every  ten  to  be  cast  by  persons  who  have 
only  such  alternatives.  Men  can  contribute  to  the  success 
of  free  government  only  by  using  the  ballot  with  intelligence 
and  reasonable  independence ;  and  this  they  can  hardly  do 
if  the  ordinary  avenues  of  information,  including  the  news- 
papers, are  closed  to  them.  Mr.  Tweed,  in  the  heyday  of 
his  domination,  declared  that  he  paid  no  heed  to  what 
the  newspapers  said  about  him,  as  most  of  his  followers 
"couldn't  read  English."  Nor  is  he  the  only  political  boss 
who  has  owed  his  power,  in  part  at  least,  to  the  fact  that 
the  illiterate  element  in  the  electorate  forms  an  unmeltable 
mass  in  the  crucible  of  public  opinion. 

Thederir-  Apart  from  the  direct  effect  upon  municipal  politics,  the 
excluding  requirement  that  men  should  be  able  to  read  and  write 
iterates.  before  securing  the  franchise  would  promote  the  cause  of 
elementary  education  in  the  humbler  walks  of  city  life. 
Grown  persons  who  remain  illiterate  furnish  more  than 
their  due  proportion  of  public  charges;  they  contribute 
far  more  than  their  quota  to  the  pauper  and  criminal  classes 
of  the  community.  As  a  measure  of  social  amelioration, 
therefore,  every  agency  that  can  be  used  to  diminish  the 
illiterate  element  in  the  population  of  the  large  city  has  a 
good  deal  to  commend  it.  The  assimilation  of  the  foreigner 
would,  moreover,  doubtless  be  accelerated  by  such  require- 
ment ;  for  education  is  a  potent  agent  of  social  fusion,  even 
though  it  be  carried  to  only  an  elementary  stage.  Taking 
all  these  considerations  into  account,  therefore,  there  is 
reason  to  believe  that  the  policy  of  permitting  enrolment  to 


THE   MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE  121 

those  only  who  can  read  and  write  might  profitably  be 
extended  to  the  states  that  have  not  yet  adopted  it. 

Laws  requiring  that  no  one  shall  vote  unless  he  has  paid  his  The  en- 
taxes  for  the  year  are  also  sound  in  motive,  although  some-  oTthTtax 
what  difficult  of  strict  enforcement.     Men  who  do  not  fulfil  re<iuire- 

mente. 

their  duties  to  the  community  ought  not  to  have  the  corre- 
sponding rights.  Yet  a  system  which  uses  the  suffrage  as  a 
means  of  collecting  taxes  —  that  is,  as  a  means  of  doing  what 
the  city's  collecting  department  ought  to  do,  but  does  not  — 
tends  to  put  an  unfair  burden  upon  the  electoral  machinery. 
The  city  ought  to  collect  its  poll-taxes  in  the  same  way  in 
which  it  enforces  its  other  monetary  claims  against  citizens. 
The  courts  are  open  to  it  for  this  purpose.  Why  they  are 
seldom  resorted  to  is  not  so  much  because  their  procedure 
is  too  slow  or  too  cumbrous  or  too  expensive.  It  is  simply 
because  the  municipal  authorities  who  attempt  to  collect 
poll-taxes  by  legal  compulsion  create  too  much  antagonism 
among  voters  who  are  in  arrears,  and  thereby  impair  their 
own  chances  of  reelection  or  political  advancement.  Hence 
it  is  that  large  cities  either  write  large  sums  off  their  books 
each  year,  or  try  to  put  the  odium  of  collecting  poll-taxes 
upon  some  self-executory  statute.  Since  it  costs  a  great 
deal  to  provide  ballots,  voting-places,  polling-officers,  and 
all  the  paraphernalia  of  an  election,  it  seems  absurd  that 
thousands  of  voters  should  be  permitted  to  evade  payment 
of  an  individual  charge  which  does  little  more  than  defray 
this  outlay. 

Improvements  might  also  be  made  in  the  relation  that  Greater 
exists   between   a   man's   voting   rights    and  his  place  of  in  " 
residence.     In  England  the   municipal   electorate  is  built 
upon  the  idea  that  occupancy  as  well  as  residence  gives  a  man  residence 

require- 

the  right  to  a  voice  in  local  affairs ;  when  a  citizen  owns  or  ments. 
occupies  an  office  or  a  store  or  a  warehouse,  he  becomes, 
as  it  were,  a  civic  stockholder,  even  though  he  may,  within 


122  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

certain  limits,  actually  reside  outside  the  municipality. 
The  English  city  accordingly  retains  upon  its  list  of  voters 
that  large  quota  of  men  whose  business  interests  are  within 
the  municipal  limits,  but  who  may  actually  reside  in  some 
suburban  towns  near  by.  American  cities,  on  the  other 
hand,  have  gone  on  the  principle  that  a  citizen's  real  interest 
can  only  be  in  that  municipality  in  which,  actually  or  con- 
structively, he  makes  his  home.  Thus,  the  man  who  owns 
a  factory  in  Boston  and  occupies  a  rented  apartment  in 
Brookline  is  presumed  by  the  law  to  have  his  real  interest 
where  common  sense  asserts  that  it  is  not.  Every  large 
American  city  therefore  loses  from  its  electorate  an  element 
which  it  would  be  most  desirable  to  retain, — namely,  those 
who  spend  their  day-hours  within  the  municipal  limits  and 
have  their  chief  economic  interests  there,  but  who  happen 
to  live  in  residential  districts  outside.  To  keep  this  element 
on  the  city  lists  it  would  not  be  necessary  to  give  any  man 
more  than  a  single  vote.  The  practice  in  vogue  in  the 
cities  of  the  French  republic,  which  allows  a  voter  to  choose 
whether  he  shall  be  enrolled  from  his  place  of  business  or 
from  his  residence  (but  not  from  both),  would  be  practicable 
in  America.  Adequate  safeguards  would  of  course  be  neces- 
sary to  prevent  duplication  of  enrolment  and  other  evils; 
but  difficulties  in  that  direction  would  hardly  prove  insu- 
perable, and  the  advantages  to  the  cause  of  better  city 
government  would  surely  be  important.  In  America  too 
much  emphasis  is  put  upon  "legal  residence"  as  a  factor  in 
the  suffrage  laws,  and  this  undue  emphasis  serves  to  deprive 
the  voters'  lists  of  what  ought,  in  large  cities,  to  be  their 
most  dependable  element. 

The  ex-  In  various  parts  of  the  United  States  a  belief  is  apparently 

suffrage        growing  that  the  plane  of  the  municipal  electorate  can  be 

wolUeni0       greatly  raised  by  the  extension  of  voting  rights  to  women. 

Whether  or  not  this  proposal  offers  more  in  the  way  of  im- 


THE  MUNICIPAL  ELECTORATE  123 

provement  than  do  the  others  mentioned  in  these  pages,  it  is 
at  any  rate  exciting  much  more  public  interest  and  discus^ 
sion.1  Although  the  American  idea  of  a  democratic  elector- 
ate does  not  necessarily  include  women,  nevertheless  the  ex- 
tension of  the  suffrage  to  them  is  one  of  the  things  which,  in 
course  of  time,  is  liable  to  follow  in  the  wake  of  pronounced 
democratic  tendencies.  When  people  believe  that  the  proper 
remedy  for  the  ills  of  democracy  is  more  democracy,  the 
suffrage  is  more  likely  to  be  widened  than  to  be  narrowed. 
In  seven  states  of  the  Union  the  right  to  vote  at  municipal 
elections  has  already  been  granted  to  women,  and  in  some 
of  them  women's  suffrage  has  been  in  existence  long  enough 
to  have  passed  the  experimental  stage.  As  to  the  influence 
which  female  participation  in  municipal  politics  has  had  upon 
city  administration  in  these  states  there  is  some  difference 
of  opinion  ;  it  has  at  any  rate  not  proved  radical  in  its  re- 
sults either  for  good  or  for  ill.  So  far  as  American  political 
experience  goes,  it  has  been  found  that  women  rise  to  their 
public  responsibilities  no  better,  and  perhaps  no  worse, 
than  men  do.  Political  opinion  in  states  which  have 
adopted  the  wider  suffrage  seems  to  be  moulded  by  the 
same  factors  and  influenced  by  the  same  considerations 
as  is  public  sentiment  in  communities  which  hold  fast  to 
the  policy  of  manhood  suffrage. 

Much  effort  in  the  cause  of  improved  municipal  adminis-  Relation  of 
tration  has  been  rendered  ineffective  through  its  failure  to          60 


strike  at  the  fundamentals  of  misgovernment.     As  a  stream  reform- 
will  rise  no  higher  than  its  source,  so  will  a  representative 
government  do  no  more  than  reflect  the  ideals  of  the  elector- 
ate which  chooses  it  and  maintains  it  in  office.     An  elector- 


1  Most  of  the  arguments  for  and  against  this  extension  of  the  suffrage 
may  be  conveniently  found  in  the  little  volume  entitled  Selected  Articles 
on  Woman  Suffrage,  in  the  Debaters'  Handbook  Series  (Minneapolis, 
1911). 


124  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

ate  made  up  even  in  part  of  persons  fraudulently  naturalized, 
or  enrolled  by  fraudulent  means,  or  voting  from  fictitious 
places  of  residence,  or  illiterate,  or  whose  civic  conscience  is 
so  numb  as  to  tolerate  evasion  of  just  dues,  —  an  electorate 
made  up  even  in  part  of  such  elements  needs  attention 
from  the  reorganizers  of  municipal  machinery  before  much 
thoroughgoing  improvement  can  be  hoped  for  in  the  work 
of  popular  representatives. 

REFERENCES 

General  questions  relating  to  the  suffrage  (apart  from  the  special  ques- 
tion of  negro  suffrage)  have  had  very  little  attention  from  American 
writers.  Interesting  discussions  of  the  right  to  vote,  in  its  wider  aspects, 
may  be  found  in  W.  E.  H.  Lecky's  Democracy  and  Liberty  (2  vols.,  Lon- 
don, 1899),  I.  2-38,  70-100,  and  Sir  Henry  S.  Maine's  Popular  Government 
(London,  1885),  chs.  i.-ii.  There  is  a  somewhat  rambling  discourse  on  the 
relation  of  universal  suffrage  to  popular  government  in  Tocqueville's 
Democracy  in  America  (ed.  D.  C.  Gilman,  2  vols.,  New  York,  1898),  I. 
ch.  xiii.  The  best  short  outline  of  the  development  from  strict  to  liberal 
suffrage  requirements  in  the  United  States  is  F.  W.  Blackmar's  article 
on  "The  History  of  Suffrage,"  in  the  Chatauquan,  XXII.  28-34  (October, 
1895).  The  relation  of  the  suffrage  system  to  present-day  municipal 
problems  is  dealt  with  somewhat  briefly  by  Professor  F.  J.  Goodnow, 
Municipal  Problems  (New  York,  1904),  ch.  vii.,  and  by  D.  F.  Wilcox, 
American  City  (New  York,  1904),  chs.  i.,  be.  A  well-written  article  by 
G.  H.  Haynes  on  "Educational  Qualifications"  may  be  found  in  the 
Political  Science  Quarterly,  XIII.  495-531 ;  and  attention  may  also  be 
called  to  the  paper  on  "Educational  Qualifications  of  Voters"  by  J.  B. 
Phillips,  in  University  of  Colorado  Studies,  III.  55-62.  Arguments  for 
and  against  restrictions  upon  universal  suffrage  were  given  at  length 
many  years  ago  in  the  report  of  a  commission  appointed  by  the  governor  of 
New  York  "to  devise  a  plan  for  the  government  of  cities  " ;  and  in  the  chapter 
entitled  "The  Voting  Many  versus  the  Taxpaying  Few,"  in  A.  P.  Wilder's 
Municipal  Problems  (New  Haven,  1891).  Other  sources  of  information 
are  by  C.  W.  Eliot,  American  Contributions  to  Civilization  (New  York, 
1897),  ch.  i.;  H.  C.  Adams,  Public  Debts  (New  York,  1898),  359-366; 
J.  S.  Mill,  Representative  Government  (London,  1894),  ch.  viii. ;  and  D.  C. 
McMillan,  The  Elective  Franchise  in  the  United  States  (New  York,  1898), 
passim.  Further  references,  chiefly  to  magazine  articles  on  the  subject, 
may  be  found  in  R.  C.  Ringwalt's  Briefs  on  Public  Questions  (New  York, 
1911),  ch.  iv.,  and  in  W.  D.  B.  Brookings  and  R.  C.  Ringwalt's  Briefs 
for  Debate  (New  York,  1911),  ch.  v. 


CHAPTER  VI 

MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS   AND   ELECTIONS 

THE  influence  of  the  electorate,  or  whole  body  of  the  The 
voters,  is  exerted  upon  the  administration  of  the  city  in  two 
ways,  directly  and  indirectly.  It  is  exerted  directly  by  the 
use  of  the  initiative,  referendum,  and  recall ;  it  is  exerted 
indirectly  in  the  nomination  and  election  of  city  officials. 
Both  directly  and  indirectly  this  electoral  influence  has 
become  more  active  in  recent  years,  but  this  is  more 
particularly  true  of  the  direct  control  which  the  voters 
exercise  over  the  conduct  of  the  city's  business.  The 
increase  in  the  direct  control  of  municipal  matters  by  the 
whole  body  of  the  voters  has,  indeed,  been  an  outstanding 
feature  in  American  political  development  during  the  last 
decade.  Its  significance  is  dealt  with  in  a  later  chapter.1 

In   general,   however,    the   government    of   the   average  Direct  and 
American  city  continues  to  exemplify  a  type  of  representa-  ^^r 
tive  rather  than  of  direct  democracy  ;  in  other  words,  popular  contro1  of 

city  gov- 

control  of  local  affairs  is  maintained  through  the  nomination  ernment. 
and  election  of  those  to  whom  the  immediate  management 
of  administration  is  intrusted.  It  is  not  so  long,  of  course, 
since  the  whole  body  of  voters  took  no  direct  part  in  mak- 
ing municipal  nominations;  this  function  used  to  be  per- 
formed by  a  very  small  section  of  the  electorate,  which 
claimed  to  represent  the  entire  body  but  rarely  did  so  in 
fact.  Nowadays,  however,  the  voters  take  upon  them- 
selves both  the  nominating  and  the  electing  of  officers,  and 

1  Below,  ch.  xiii. 
125 


126 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


History  of 

nominating 

methods. 


Rise  of  the 
convention. 


this  development  from  the  old  caucus  to  the  open  primary 
affords  one  of  the  best  illustrations  of  that  general  popu- 
larizing of  electoral  machinery  which  has  been  taking  place 
during  recent  years. 

In  the  earlier  stages  of  American  municipal  development, 
the  laws  provided  no  nominating  machinery.  Candidates 
for  office  were  brought  forward  by  a  few  friends,  or  they 
came  forward  of  their  own  initiative.  Sometimes  an 
informal  meeting  of  a  few  representative  citizens  was  per- 
mitted to  decide  what  names  should  be  put  before  the 
voters.  So  long  as  the  cities  remained  small  in  population 
and  with  few  elective  officers,  and  so  long  as  restrictions 
upon  the  suffrage  kept  the  voting  element  still  smaller, 
these  informal  methods  of  nomination,  in  which  the  mass  of 
the  electorate  had  no  share,  seem  to  have  been  readily 
tolerated ;  and  they  continued  in  existence  through  the 
first  three  decades  of  the  nineteenth  century.1  The  change 
from  informal  to  formal  methods  of  nominating  candidates 
for  municipal  offices  was  one  of  the  many  shifts  in  the  whole 
American  electoral  system  which  came  in  the  wake  of  the 
Jacksonian  propaganda.  Largely  through  the  onslaught 
made  upon  it  by  Andrew  Jackson,  the  congressional  caucus 
as  a  means  of  nominating  candidates  for  the  presidency 
was  definitely  superseded  m  1840  bv  the  national  party  con- 
vention, made  up  of  delegates  from  the  various  states.  So 
also,  but  rather  earlier,  the  legislative  caucus  as  a  means 
of  nominating  candidates  for  state  offices  gave  way  to  the 
state  party  convention ;  and,  as  part  of  the  same  movement, 
the  local  party  convention,  made  up  of  delegates  chosen  by 
a  caucus  of  voters  in  each  ward,  was  established  as  the 


1  For  a  full  discussion  of  this  topic,  see  G.  D.  Luetscher,  Early  Polit- 
ical Machinery  in  the  United  States  (Philadelphia,  1903),  and  M.  Ostro- 
gorski,  on  "The  Rise  and  Fall  of  the  Nominating  Caucus,'!  in  American 
Historical  Review,  V.  253-283  (January,  1900). 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        127 

ordinary  method  of  nominating  candidates  for  ..  piujn'p.ipa] 
offices.1 

The  new  system  began  its  career  in  municipal  history  Abuses  of 
under  serious  handicaps.  Its  adoption  came  at  a  time  when  tion  system" 
cities,  owing  to  the  rising  tide  of  immigration,  were  begin- 
ning to  grow  rapidly.  This  growth  gave  impetus  to  the 
creation  of  new  public  services,  such  as  street  pavements, 
public  buildings,  water  and  sewerage  systems.  The  new 
services  enlarged  the  patronage  of  the  city  authorities, 
both  by  necessitating  the  creation  of  new  administrative 
offices  and  bv  increasing  the  annual  expenditure  for  public 
work  and  materials.  The  spoils  increased  proportionally; 
until,  in  an  age  when  partisan  victors  were  regarded  as 
fairly  entitled  to  the  emoluments  of  office  and  the  profits 
of  patronage,  the  incentives  to  party  victory  were  very 
great.  Large  prizes  often  hinged  upon  the  issue  of  attempts 
to  capture  the  nominating  convention,  with  the  result 
that  almost  every  imaginable  form  of  trickery  and  fraud 
was  resorted  to  by  political  leaders.  The  rules  governing 
ward  caucuses  and  party  conventions  as  to  the  manner  of 
calling  them  together  T  the  times  and  places  of  meeting,  and 
the  general  procedure  were  not  prescribed  bv  law,  but  were . 
made  and  unmade  by  the  caucuses  and  conventions  them- 
selves. There  were  therefore  no  real  securities  for  fair 
play;  and  that  faction  of  the  party  which  could,  by  any 
manner  of  fraud  or  violence,  once  get  control  of  a  caucus  or 
a  convention  was  almost  certain  to  put  through  its  slate  of 
candidates.  Caucuses  were  often  called  upon  inadequate 
notice,  in  rooms  too  small  to  hold  any  but  those  who  were 
warned  to  come  early ;  the  meetings  were  not  uncommonly 
packed  with  political  thugs  from  outside  the  ward ;  the 
ballot-box  was  frequently  stuffed,  or,  when  the  end  was  not 

1  M.  Ostrogorski,  Democracy  and  the  Party  System  (New  York,  1910), 
chs.  ii.-iv. 


128  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

achieved  by  some  such  method,  the  count  of  ballots  was 
falsified.  Any  one  of  a  hundred  ingenious  devices  was  em- 
ployed to  serve  the  ends  of  an  unscrupulous  faction.1  Yet 
the  political  alignment  in  many  cities  was  such  that  the 
faction  which  captured  the  caucuses,  and  through  them  the 
nominating  convention,  thereby  put  upon  the  ballot  candi- 
dates who  were  practically  certain  to  be  elected.  It  gradu- 
ally dawned  upon  the  public  mind,  therefore,  that  under 
such  a  system  representative  government  was  a  travesty, 
that  the  voters  oi  the  city  were  allowed  to  do  no  more  at 
the  polls  than  choose  between  two  sets  of  professional 
politicians,  each  tagged  with  a  party  label  that  had  been 
gained,  in  many  cases,  by  resort  to  violence  or  subterfuge. 
With  an  adequate  realization  of  this  state  of  things  there 
began  a  popular  movement  for  the  regulation  of  party 
nominations  by  law. 

The  first  attempt  to  furnish  legal  securities  for  fair  play 
in  political  caucuses  and  conventions  was  made  by  the 
legislature  of  California  in  1866 :  but  the  statute  then 
passed,  though  comprehensive  in  its  safeguarding  provisions, 
was  optional  in  its  application ;  that  is,  it  was  to  apply  only 
to  such  political  party  or  parties  as  might  accept  its  provis- 
ions.2 In  the  same  year  the  legislature  of  New  York  passed^ 
a  statute  of  similar  type,  less  comprehensive  in  its  provisions 
but  mandatory  in  application.3  This  measure,  despite  its 
inadequacy  to  secure  all  the  ends  desired,  marked  a  new  de- 
parture in  American  municipal  policy ;  for  it  was  virtually  an 

1 C.  E.  Merriam,  Primary  Elections  (Chicago,  1909),  7.  See  also 
F.  W.  Dallinger,  Nominations  for  Elective  Office  (New  York,  1897),  especially 
chs.  v.-vi. 

*  "An  Act  to  Protect  the  Elections  of  Voluntary  Associations  and  to 
Punish  Frauds  therein  : "  Laws  of  California,  1866,  ch.  359. 

"An  Act  to  Protect  Primary  Meetings,  Caucuses,  and  Conventions 
of  Political  Parties  : "  Laws  of  New  York,  1866,  ch.  783.  Similar  acts  were 
passed  by  Ohio  and  Pennsylvania  in  1871,  and  by  Missouri  in  1875. 
In  1874  California  extended  the  scope  of  its  optional  statute. 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        129 


acceptance  of  the  principle  that  political  pajfipg  g.g 
tions  for  nominating  candidates  should  be  formally  recog- 
nized by  law,  and  that  their  methods  of  performing  this 
public  function  should  he  laid  down  for  them  by  statutory 
provisions.  Other  states  gradually  gave  their  adhesion  to 
this  policy,  and  in  so  doing  usually  extended  the  scope  of 
their  laws,  until  in  course  of  time  many  of  the  safeguards 
applicable  to  regular  elections  were  applied  to  party  nomi- 
nations. Not,  however,  till  more  than  thirty  years  after 
New  York  first  committed  itself  to  the  principle  of  statu- 
tory regulation  had  two-thirds  of  all  the  states  enacted 
primary  laws.1 

The  general  purport  of  such  laws,  so  far  as  they  apply  The  party 
to  cities,  is  to  require  that  nominations  shall  be  made  by  pnmary- 
the  voters  of  the  respective  political  parties  at  a  regular 
primary  election,  upon  official  ballots,  and  under  official 
supervision.  The  party  primary,  as  established  by  these 
laws,  may  be  either  "closed"  or  "open."  The  former 
type  of  primary  is  the  more  common,  and  its  chief  charac- 
teristic is  that  only  regular  members  of  the  party  can 
take  part  in  it.  Although  theoretically  superior  to  the 
old  caucus  and  convention  systems,  in  that  it  aims  to 
secure  a  fair  opportunity  for  the  expression  of  a  party's 
opinions,  the  closed  primary  in  the  municipal  system  has 
some  serious  defects.  In  the  first  place,  it  is  based  upon 
the  assumption  that  all  municipal  voters  have  some  definite 
party  allegiance.  This  does  not  necessarily  mean  that 
the  voter  must  actually  bear  allegiance  to  one  or  other 
of  the  state  parties,  but  in  practice  it  commonly  works 
out  that  way.  It  may  almost  be  said,  indeed,  that  the 
spread  of  the  closed  primary  has  helped  to  give  state-party- 
ism  in  municipal  affairs  an  extended  lease  of  life.  This  is 

1  For  an  extended  account  of  this  development,  see  C.  E.  Merriam, 
Primary  Elections,  chs.  ii.-vi. 

K 


130  GOVERNMENT    OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

because  the  voter,  either  at  the  time  of  registration  or  at 
the  primary,  is  in  most  states  required  to  disclose  the  party 
to  which  he  belongs ;  for,  as  a  matter  of  practice,  separate 
lists  of  voters  are  usually  made,  and  the  parties  commonly 
hold  their  primaries  on  different  dates.  Even  in  Massa- 
chusetts, where  joint  primaries  are  held  and  a  single  voters' 
list  used,  the  voter  must  nevertheless  declare  the  party 
to  which  he  belongs,  and  in  accordance  with  his  statement 
receives  the  ballot  of  his  own  party.1  This  necessity  of 
declaring  affiliations  has  been  one  of  the  chief  objections  raised 
against  the  closed  primary.  Sometimes  the  method  whereby 
a  voter  shall  declare  his  party  allegiance,  and  the  rules 
governing  the  acceptance  of  his  declaration,  are  left  to  the 
party  authorities ;  but  more  commonly  the  means  by  which 
his  party  affiliation  shall  be  established  are  prescribed  by 
state  laws.  Some  states  require  a  declaration  of  his  past 
allegiance,  others  of  his  present  preference,  and  a  few  pre- 
scribe that  he  shall  say  which  party  he  intends  to  support 
at  the  next  election.  The  rules  relating  to  the  way  in  which 
such  declarations  are  recorded,  the  degree  of  secrecy  to  be 

1  At  the  hearings  held  in  Boston  a  couple  of  years  ago  by  a  joint 
committee  of  the  New  York  legislature,  nearly  all  those  who  testified 
were  of  the  opinion  that  the  Massachusetts  system  of  holding  joint 
party  primaries  had,  after  a  trial  of  nine  years,  proved  a  failure,  so  far 
as  providing  a  satisfactory  method  of  nominating  municipal  officers  was 
concerned.  It  was  urged  by  those  who  appeared  before  the  committee 
that  both  the  character  and  the  caliber  of  candidates  had  deteriorated 
since  the  introduction  of  the  system,  that  their  expenses  for  nomination 
had  greatly  increased  (in  a  threefold  measure,  according  to  one  who  had 
been  a  candidate  under  both  the  convention  and  the  primary  system), 
that  contests  for  nominations  had  become  campaigns  of  personalities 
rather  than  of  principles,  that  party  responsibility  had  declined,  and 
that  the  members  of  the  minority  party  took  very  little  interest  in  the 
primaries.  A  digest  of  this  testimony  is  given  in  Report  of  the  Joint 
Committee  of  the  Senate  and  Assembly  of  the  State  of  New  York  appointed 
to  investigate  the  Primary  and  Election  Laws  of  this  and  other  States 
(Albany,  1901),  5-29.  In  corroboration,  see  also  Reports  of  the  Boston 
Finance  Commission  (7  vols.,  Boston,  1908-1912),  II.  22-24. 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        131 

maintained  by  officials  who  receive  them,  and  various  other 
matters  differ  greatly  from  state  to  state.1 

The  other  type  of  party  primary  is  that  used,  for  ex-  The  open 
ample,  in  Wisconsin  and  commonly  called  the  "open" 
primary.  Candidates  for  nomination  at  the  open  primary 
bear  the  designations  of  their  respective  parties ;  but  no 
disclosure  of  party  affiliations  is  exacted  from  voters.  The 
same  ballot  serves  for  all.  Hence  the  voter  may  record  his 
choice  for  the  candidates  of  either  party  and  his  action  will 
remain  known  to  no  one  but  himself. 

Both  forms  of  primary  election  described  in  the  fore- 
going paragraphs  are  party  primaries.  They  rest  on  the 
idea  that,  whether  asked  to  disclose  their  partisan  allegiance 
or  not,  the  voters  should  be  given  their  choice  between 
candidates  whose  names  bear  party  designations  on  the 
ballot.  On  the  principle,  however,  that  party  desip^fl-*'1'011* 
ought  to  have  no  place  on  the  municipal  ballot  at  anv 
election,  whether  preliminary  or  final,  some  cities  have, 
established  the  nonpartisan  primary.  This  system,  as 
a  method  of  nominating  candidates  for  municipal  offices, 
was  first  tried  in  Iowa,  where  the  legislature  applied  it  to 
such  cities  as  might  accept  the  commission  form  of  govern- 
ment.2 It  was  adopted  at  once  by  Des  Moines,  and  went 
into  operation  there  in  1907.  Since  that  date  it  has  gained 
acceptance  in  many  of  the  cities  governed  by  commissions, 
and  in  at  least  two  states  permission  has  been  granted  for  its 
adoption  by  cities  that  desire  to  retain  their  old  frames  of 
government.3  Under  this  type  of  primary,  municipal  officers 

1  A  summary  of  such  regulations  may  be  found  in  Comparative  Legis- 
lation Bulletin,  No.  13,  issued  by  the  Legislative  Reference  Department 
of  the  Wisconsin  Free  Library  Commission  in  1903. 

2  Laws  of  Iowa,  1907,  ch.  48.    The  more  important  provisions  of  this 
statute  are  printed  in  C.  L.  Jones's  Readings  on  Parties  and  Elections  (New 
York,  1912),  67-70. 

J  Laws  of  Wisconsin,  1907,  ch.  670 ;  Laws  of  Minnesota,  1909,  ch.  170. 


132 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Objections 
to  the 
primary 

eyetem. 


are  selected  by  what  is  virtually  a  double  election.  When 
the  time  for  a  municipal  election  draws  near,  notice  is  given 
that  any  one  who  desires  to  be  a  candidate  may  have  his 
name  entered  upon  the  primary  ballot  by  presenting  a  pe- 
tition signed  by  a  small  number  of  qualified  voters,  usually 
twenty-five.  All  such  names  are  put  upon  the  ballot 
without  any  party  designation  whatever,  the  order  being 
determined  alphabetically,  or  by  the  course  in  which  the 
petitions  were  filed,  or  by  lot.  As  all  voters  at  the  primary 
use  the  same  ballot,  there  is  no  disclosure  of  partisan  prefer- 
ences. The  two  candidates  who  make  the  highest  showing 
for  an  office  are  thereupon  named  upon  the  general  ballot 
to  be  used  at  the  regular  election.  T"  ^i^  ™°y  +he 


tisan  primary  becomes  a  sort,  of  qualifying  heat  which  elimi- 
nates the  weaker  contestants  from  participation  in  the  final 
race.  As  such  it  has  undoubted  merits.  It  insures  the 
.election  of  municipal  officials  by  a  majority,  rather  than  by 
a  mere  plurality,  of  the  polled  votes,  and  thus  accomplishes 
at  American  city  elections  what  is  obtained  by  the  use 
of  the  system  of  supplementary  elections  in  Germany,  the 
chief  difference  being  that  in  Germany  a  candidate  who 
polls  a  clear  majority  at  the  first  election  is  declared  thereby 
to  have  been  finally  chosen,  and  there  is  no  need  for  a  second 
polling.1  The  nonpartisan  primary  must  also  to  some  ex- 
tent encourage  independent  candidacy  ;  it  helps  to  oust  state 
politics  from  city  affairs  ;  it  insures  a  short  ballot  for  the 
final  election  ;  and  it  puts  the  whole  responsibility  for  satis- 
factory nominations  upon  the  voters  themselves. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  nonpartisan  primary  has  in  actual 
operation  disclosed  some  objectionable  features.  The  total 
vote  cast  at  a  primary,  though  probably  larger  on  the  whole 

1  In  San  Francisco  and  a  few  other  American  cities  the  laws  provide 
that  a  clear  majority  at  the  primary  secures  the  actual  election  of  any 
candidate. 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        133 

than  that  which  was  commonly  polled  in  the  election  of 
delegates  to  a  nominating  convention,  is  usually  much  smaller 
than  that  polled  at  a  regular  election.  Unless  there  be 
important  local  issues  represented  by  rival  candidates, 
the  primary  is  not  likely  to  draw  out  the  voters  in  great 
numbers;  and  when  a  large  part  of  the  available  vote  is 
not  forthcoming,  it  is  usually  found  that  the  stav-at-homes 
include  most  of  those  whose  participation  at  the  nomination 
of  candidates  is  much  needed  in  the  interest  of  good  city 
government. 

Again,  the  nonpartisan  primary  is  costly  to  all  concerned,  its  costii- 
and  particularly  to  the  candidates.  The  candidate  who  hopes 
for  success  must,  in  the  absence  of  party  backing,  make 
himself  known  to  the  mass  of  the  voters;  and  this  he 
can  do,  as  a  rule,  only  by  means  of  an  advertising  campaign 
which  involves  considerable  outlay  either  on  his  own  part  or 
on  that  of  his  friends.  The  advantage,  under  the  nonp arti- 
san primary  system,  lies  with  the  candidate  who  can  prosecute 
the  most  effective  publicity  campaign.  This  fact  has  become 
so  far  recognized  of  late  that  some  states  and  cities  are 
undertaking  to  give  equal  publicity  to  the  claims  of  all  the 
aspirants  by  sending  to  every  voter  a  pamphlet,  printed  and 
mailed  at  public  expense.  Such  an  arrangement  might  have 
a  tendency  to  multiply  candidates,  since  there  are  undoubt- 
edly not  a  few  men  in  every  community  who  would  grasp  the 
opportunity  to  have  their  public  virtues  set  forth  broadcast 
without  any  cost  to  themselves.  Precautions  against  this 
contingency  could,  it  may  be  suggested,  be  taken  by  a  pro- 
vision that  a  small  sum  toward  the  cost  of  the  pamphlet 
shall  be  assessed  upon  each  candidate,  but  under  the  present 
constitutions  of  many  states  this  would  be  impracticable  in 
view  of  provisions  which  prescribe  freedom  of  candidacy 
for  public  office. 

Whether  the  nonpartisan  primary  secures  the  nomination 


134  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

The  type      of  better  candidates  than  either  the  convention  or  the  parti- 
da^which    san  primary  is  not  yet  established.    So  far  as  can  be  judged 
it  promotes.   from  the  experience  of  a  few  years,  it  gives  great  advantages 
to  the  smooth  man  who  is  willing  to  spend  money  in  making 
himself  known,  or  to  the  aspirant  who  keeps  himself  much  in 
the  public  eye,  regardless  of  the  way  in  which  he  gets  himself 
there.     Public  prominence  is  by  no  means  synonymous  with 
past  service ;  a  man  may  have  acquired  the  one  without  hav- 
ing given  the  other.     Many  voters  who  go  to  the  nonparti- 
san  primary  are  confronted  with  a  sheet  of  names  wholly 
unknown  to  them.     Having  no  party  designations  to  guide 
them,  they  are  apt  to  be  influenced  by  some  inconsequential 
things,  such  as  the  race  or  the  religion  of  a  candidate  as 
indicated  by  his  name,  or  the  place  which  a  name  occupies 
on  the  ballot  paper.     In  some  cities  a  candidate  is  permitted 
to  put  on  the  ballot,  after  his  name,  a  short  statement  of 
his  claims  to  the  support  of  voters.     If  he  has  had  some 
experience  in  municipal  office,  and  mentions  this  fact  on 
the  ballot,  he  furnishes  some  information  that  may  be  of 
service  to  voters ;  but  the  set  of  alliterative  adjectives  with 
which  most  candidates  adorn  their  names  on  the  primary 
ballot  is  of  little  or  no  help  to  any  one.     It  has  been  well 
said  that   the  primary  offers  a   greater  opportunity  than 
the  convention  for  the  defeat  of  a  conspicuously  unfit  aspir- 
ant,  and  that  one  who  is  known  to  the   community  as 
unusually  well-qualified  for  any  position  is  more  likely  to 
secure  a  nomination  from  the  voters  than  from  a  convention. 
The  usual  aspirant  for  a  municipal  nomination,  however,  is 
in  neither  of  these  categories ;  and  in  the  matter  of  sorting 
out  the  best  among  a  list  of  average  candidates  neither 
system  seems  to  have  done  much  better  than  the  other. 
At  its  best  the  convention  was  capable  of  high-grade  work. 


merits  of 
the  prims 
and  the 

convention,    showing  sufficient  vigor  compel  the  majority  to  accept,  in 


the  primary  Now  and  then  a  small  minority  of  the  delegates  could  by 

and  the  '  J 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        135 

the  interests  of  harmony,  a  candidate  of  better  stamp  than 
would  otherwise  have  been  chosen.  Under  this  system 
there  was  always  an  opportunity  for  compromise,  and  a 
vigorous  minority  could  at  least  make  its  influence  felt  in 
the  outcome.  Under  the  primary  systemT  whether  partisan 
or  nonpartisan,  the  door  of  compromise  is  pretty  nearly, 
closed.  The  majority,  whatever  be  its  ideals,  must  have 
its  whole  way.  This  would  not  be  so  bad,  however,  were  it 
not  that  the  majority  opinion,  as  expressed  at  the  primary, 
is  often  no  more  than  a  public  ratification  of  some  de- 
cision already  reached  in  caucus  conclave  by  a  few  leaders. 
This  is  because  the  direct  primary,  whether  open,  closed 
or  nonpartisan,  has  not  done  away  with  the  making  of 
slates  by  those  who,  through  some  means  or  other,  can 
exert  influence  upon  certain  elements  among  the  voters. 
It  has  merely  pressed  back  the  process  of  slate-making 
from  a  point  preceding  the  election  to  a  point  preceding 
the  primary.  In  many  cases  the  primary  has  become  little 
more  than  a  preliminary  contest  between  those  candidates 
who  have  organized  support  and  those  who  have  not ;  and 
the  result,  too  often,  is  just  what  it  would  be  under  any 
other  system  of  nomination.  The  chief  difference  is  that  it 
permits  the  leaders  who  have  really  determined  the  out- 
come to  avoid  all  responsibility  for  it.  Under  the  conven- 
tion system  the  boss  could  dictate  nominations  with  rea- 
sonable certainty,  but  he  had  to  take  the  responsibility  for 
the  slate  which  he  presented;  under  the  primary  arrange- 
ments he  may  be  less  certain  to  have  his  way,  but  when  he 
does  get  it  he  can  rarely  be  made  to  bear  any  responsibility 
whatever. 

The  primary,  furthermore,  proves  an  excellent  weapon  its  effect 
of  discipline  among  the  rank  and  file  of  a  party.     The  removal  party* 
of  party  designations  from  the  ballot  does  not  in  practice 
eliminate    the    obligation    to    stanch    partisan    allegiance. 


136  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

The  word  is  passed  out  by  the  leaders,  and  it  is  pretty 
generally  obeyed.  The  aspirant  who  questions  the  judg- 
ment of  his  party  superiors  may  take  his  chances  at  the 
primary,  and  in  some  cases  may  succeed,  but  the  chances 
are,  in  the  long  run  and  under  ordinary  circumstances, 
heavily  against  him.  Under  the  old  system  the  leaders, 
to  make  things  run  smoothly,  usually  found  it  desirable 
to  conciliate  rather  than  to  discipline  the  recalcitrant  who 
showed  that  he  had  some  followers/  Mow  all  they  need  to 
do  is  to  tell  the  man  who  thinks  he~Eas  a  foIlowing^^EKat 
entitles  him  to  recognition  by  the  party  leaders  to  put  His 
name  on  the  primary  ballot  and  let  his  strength  with  the 
voters  disclose  itself.  For  his  defeat  there  he"  can  muster 
up  no  reasonable  grudge.  The  primary  has  thus  become, 
in  some  measure,  a  useful  means  of  healing  breaches  in 
the  party  organization,  and  of  enabling  the  machine  to 
come  forward  to  the  elections  without  a  trace  of  friction.1 

In  view  of  these  various  drawbacks,  it  is  very  unlikely 
*nat  tne  primary,  in  any  of  the  types  now  used,  will  prove 
a  satisfactory  and  final  solution  of  those  problems  which 

question. 

connect  themselves  with  municipal  nomination  methods; 
for  it  is  based  upon  the  assumption  that  the  voters  will 
act  wisely  without  leadership,  rather  than  upon  the  principle 
that  they  will  follow  wise  leadership.  This  is  just  the  trouble 
with  too  many  latter-day  political  reforms :  they  endeavor 
to  supplant  vicious  leadership  by  no  leadership  at  all.  If 
they  assumed  the  inevitableness  of  leadership  and  strove  to 
make  it  responsible,  the  results  would  undoubtedly  be 
better. 

Nomination  It  was  a  feeling  that  the  whole  primary  system  was  faulty 
in  some  of  the  directions  above  indicated  which  led  to  the 
adoption,  in  the  amended  Boston  charter,  of  the  System  of 

1  This  has  been  the  experience  in  Massachusetts ;  in  several  other 
states,  however,  this  feature  has  not  as  yet  disclosed  itself. 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        137 

nomination  by  petition.  Since  1909  it  has  been  possible  for 
any  Boston  voter  to  appear  upon  the  municipal  ballot  as  a 
candidate  for  election  to  the  office  of  mayor,  or  to  the  city 
council  or  the  school  committee,  by  filing  with  the  election 
board,  at  least  twenty-five  days  prior  to  the  election,  nomina- 
tion papers  bearing  at  least  5000  valid  signatures.  Signatures 
are  valid  for  this  purpose  only  if  made  by  registered  voters 
who  have  signed  no  more  papers  than  there  are  places 
to  be  filled.  Each  paper  bears  the  name  and  residence  of 
the  candidate,  but  no  party  designation;  it  contains  also 
the  names  of  five  or  more  other  persons  who,  in  case  the 
candidate  should  later  withdraw,  would  have  power  to  name 
a  substitute.  The  papers  are  examined  by  the  election 
commissioners,  who  check  each  name  by  the  voters'  lists.1 

In  actual  operation  thus  far,  the  system  of  nomination  its  actual 
by  large  petitions  has  shown  itself  to  be  possessed  of  great 
merits  and  of  equally  obvious  defects.  Without  doubt  it 
has  weakened  the  influence  of  party  organizations  in  con- 
trolling nominations ;  for,  though  candidates  can  secure 
signatures  much  more  easily  when  they  have  an  organization 
behind  them,  it  is  nevertheless  quite  possible  to  obtain  them 
by  the  efforts  of  a  few  individuals  without  this  support. 
To  that  extent,  therefore,  the  system  has  weakened  party 
disciplineT  since  the  elimination  of  the  candidates  who  have 
no  political  faction  behind  them  does  not  take  place  until  the 
election.  Again,  unlike  the  primary^  the  system  ?f  nomina- 
tion bv  petition  gives  every  element  in  the  community  a 
chance  to  put  forward  its  own  candidate:  it  does  not  re- 
strict the  race  to  the  two  strongest  candidates.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  has  not  put  an  end  to  the  preliminary  caucus ; 
in  fact,  the  real  selection  of  candidates  is  usually  made  by 
rival  organizations,  through  their  committees,  some  weeks 
before  the  time  for  filing  nominations  arrives.  To  get  the 

1  Acts  and  Resolves  of  Massachusetts,  1909,  ch.  486,  §  53. 


138 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


procedure. 


required  signatures  for  these  candidates,  moreover,  does  not 
by  any  means  prove  to  be  so  easy  a  task  as  was  antici- 
pated. The  system  has  also  brought  in  its  train  a  good  deal 
of  chicanery,  forcing  of  names,  and  other  illicit  practices.. 
On  the  whole,  however,  it  serves  the  cause  of  independence 
in  municipal  politics  better  than  any  of  the  nominating 
systems  which  preceded  it,  for  it  encourages  the  putting 
forward  of  candidates  who,  despite  their  personal  merits, 
would  have  little  chance  of  nomination  at  the  hands  of  either 
a  convention  or  a  primary. 

The  establishment,  in  American  cities,  of  a  system  of 
nominations  that  will  give  every  citizen  a  fair  chance  to 
°^er  himself  as  a  candidate  for  public  office  and  yet  not 
bring  an  avalanche  of  names  upon  the  ballot  is  something 
yet  to  be  achieved.  One  is  moved  to  ask,  however,  why  this 
should  be  so  serious  a  problem  in  America  when  it  is  such  in 
no  other  country.  In  England  it  needs  the  names  of  only 
ten  qualified  voters  to  put  a  candidate  before  the  municipal 
electorate  ;  in  France  and  Germany  any  voter  may  become  a 
candidate  for  municipal  office  upon  his  own  personal 
announcement.  Even  in  the  cities  of  Canada,  where  social 
and  political  conditions  are  not  very  different  from  those  of 
American  municipalities,  any  two  voters  may  officially 
nominate  a  candidate.  In  all  these  countries  the  road  to  a 
place  on  the  ballot  is  easy  enough;  yet  the  number  of 
municipal  candidates  is  everywhere  smaller  than  in  the 
United  States.  What  one  may  have  for  the  asking  one  is 
not  apt  to  desire  for  its  own  sake.  Mere  candidacy  for_ 
municipal  office  is  regarded  as  an  honor  nowhere  but  in  the 
United  States,  and  it  is  so  regarded  here  only  because 
nominations  nave  been  made  so  difficult.  When  it  is  nearly 
as  hard  to  get  one's  name  on  the  ballot  as  it  is  to  win  an 
election,  and  sometimes  even  harder,  nominations  are  liable 
to  be  too  much  sought  for  their  own  sake.  If  the  American 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        139 

city  were  to  put  upon  its  ballot  the  name  of  any  voter  who 
asked  to  appear  there,  it  would  find,  judging  from  the 
experience  of  every  other  country,  that,  far  from  being 
deluged  with  aspirants,  it  would  in  the  long  run  have 
fewer  names  on  the  ballot  than  under  a  system  demanding 
5000  signatures.  Nomination  reform  ought  to  move  in  the 
direction  of  simplification ;  its  aim  ought  to  be  to  make  it 
as  easy  for  a  voter  to  have  his  name  printed  on  the  ballot 
as  it  now  is  for  him  to  write  it  there  when  he  goes  to  the 
polls.  Were  this  done,  many  of  the  present  nomination 
problems  might  eventually  pass  out  of  existence. 

Municipal  elections  in  the  United  States  have  presented  Municipal 
various  difficulties;  there  have  been  times,  in  most  of  the 
large  cities,  when  it  has  seemed  well-nigh  impossible  to 
secure  a  full  and  fair  expression  of  popular  opinion  at  the 
polls.1  Most  of  these  difficulties  have,  however,  been  met 
and  so  far  overcome  that  elections  are  nowadays  conducted 
about  as  fairly  and  as  efficiently  in  the  United  States  as  in 
any  other  country.  There  are,  nevertheless,  four  matters 
connected  with  election  methods  and  machinery  upon 
which  there  is  still  no  uniformity  of  practice  or  opinion. 
These  relate  to  the  proper  date  for  a  municipal  election,  the 
selection  of  polling-places,  the  form  and  contents  of  the 
ballot,  and  the  prohibition  of  election  practices  that  are 
unduly  expensive,  unfair,  or  corrupt. 

As  to  the  proper  date  of  a  municipal  election,  the  chief  The  date 
question  is  whether  it  should  be  held  upon  the  same  day 
as  the  state  election  or  not.     In  favor  of  holding  both  elec^  tioa' 
tions  upon  the  same  dav  mav  be  urged  the  saving  in  expense. 
Elections  are  costly,  more  so  than  the  average  citizen  imag- 
ines.    The  registration  of  voters,   the  printing   of  ballots, 

1  For  an  account  of  the  methods  that  have  been  used  to  win  elections 
in  New  York  and  Philadelphia,  see  C.  L.  Jones,  Readings  on  Parties  and 
Elections  (New  York,  1912),  282-296. 


140 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Objections 
to  the 
practice 
of  holding 
state  and 
municipal 
elections  on 
the  same 
day. 


the  rental  of  polling-rooms,  the  payment  of  polling-officers, 
and  similar  items  of  expenditure  combine  to  put  upon  the 
city  a  cost  which  amounts  to  about  a  dollar  for  every  ballot 
cast  at  a  municipal  election.  To  this  must  be  added  the 
legitimate  and  necessary  expenses  of  a  campaign  which, 
though  not  paid  for  out  of  the  municipal  treasury,  yet  fall 
upon  the  community  in  which  the  election  takes  place. 
When  state  and  municipal  elections  are  held  upon  the  same 
day,  there  is  thus  a  large  saving  both  in  official  and  in  cam- 
paign expenses.  Moreover,  this  policy  insures  thft  pnl]jng 
of  a  larger  percentage  of  the  registered  vote.  Voters  seem 
to  come  to  the  polls  in  numbers  proportioned  to  the  impor- 
tance of  the  election.  The  maximum  vote  appears  when 
the  national,  state,  and  municipal  elections  all  come  together. 
When  the  city  election  is  isolated  from  the  others,  popular 
interest  in  it  seems  ordinarily  to  flag  unless  some  unusual 
stimulus  is  applied  to  it ;  and  a  small  polled  vote  at  a  city 
election  is  unfortunate,  not  only  because  it  gives  no  fair 
reflection  of  public  opinion,  but  because  the  friends  of  well- 
ordered  administration  usually  form  more  than  their  due 
proportion  of  the  absentees. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  practice  of  holding  state  and 
municipal  elections  on  the  same  day  has  been  influential  in 
bringing  state  politics  into  city  affairs.  Identity  of  election 
dates  usually  means  that  the  state  and  municipal  parties 
conduct  a  mutual  campaign,  which  is  another  way  of  saying 
that  the  interests  of  each  party  organization  in  the  city  will 
be  sacrificed,  whenever  necessary,  to  the  interests  of  the 
same  party  organization  in  the  state.  As  will  be  suggested 
in  a  later  chapter,  partyism  is  not  in  itself  an  objectionable 
feature  of  a  municipal  campaign.  The  objection  is  only 
to  the  identification  of  state  and  municipal  partyism,  or, 
in  other  words,  to  the  trailing  into  the  municipal  arena  of 
party  programmes  and  partyisms  which  have  no  local 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        141 


relevance.  So  Igng  as  the  voters  of  a  city  divide  according 
to  their  state-party  affiliationsT  there  is  little  or  no  oppor- 
tunity for  division  upon  local  issues.  Municipal  partyism 
can  be  developed  only  when  local  issues  are  made  to  serve 
as  the  basis  of  political  cleavage.  The  holding  of  state  and 
municipal  elections  on  different  days  is  one  of  the  features, 
though  only  one,  which  make  the  rise  of  local  parties  possible. 
Most  cities,  actuated  by  a  desire  to  divorce  local  from  state 
politics,  have  kept  their  municipal  elections  upon  a  date 
apart;  Boston,  Chicago,  and  San  Francisco  are  examples. 
On  the  other  hand,  Baltimore,  and  a  few  other  cities 
elect  their  municipal  officers  on  the  regular  state-election 
day. 

In  the  selection  of  places  for  municipal  polling  a  few  Polling- 
matters  are  worth  bearing  in  mind.  Polling-places  should  be  p  a 
located  where  they  will  best  serve  the  convenience  of  voters  ; 
they  should  be  at  yoints  easy  to  find  without  detailed  direc- 
tions; and,  wherever  practicable,  public  buildings  should 
be  used  for  the  purpose.  A  schoolroom  forms  an  ideal 
polling-place,  if  it  be  available.  In  some  European  cities 
schools  are  always  so  used  ;  but  in  America,  where  elections 
are  almost  invariably  held  on  a  Tuesday,  schoolrooms  are 
on  that  day  in  use  for  their  regular  purpose.  When  it 
becomes  necessary  to  rent  polling-places,  it  is  usual  to 
avoid  certain  buildings,  such  as  those  in  which  intoxicating 
liquors  are  sold;  in  many  cities,  indeed,  the  law  forbids 
the  holding  of  a  poll  in  or  adjacent  to  such  premises.  Build- 
ings that  are  used  for  sectarian  purposes,  or  that  are  associ- 
ated in  the  popular  mind  with  any  partisan  propaganda, 
are  also  commonly  avoided.  Some  cities  have  found  it 
profitable  to  provide  themselves  with  portable  booths 
which  can  be  set  up  in  a  public  square  or  other  convenient 
place  for  use  on  election  day. 

Of  greater  importance,  however,  than  the  time  or  the  The  ballot. 


142 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Objections 
to  the  old 

ballot. 


Introduc- 
tion of  the 
Australian 
ballot. 


place  of  polling  is  the  form  of  ballot  used.  That  it  should 
be  such  as  will  enable  a  voter  to  record  his  opinion  secretly 
is  a  feature  recognized  in  all  American  cities.  In  the  earlier 
periods  of  American  municipal  history  voters  were  required 
to  provide  their  own  ballots ;  but  candidates  and  their  or- 
ganizations soon  adopted  the  practice  of  preparing  printed 
slips  which  voters  might  use  if  they  wished.  As  the  number 
of  elective  officers  increased,  these  ballots  grew  in  size, 
until  it  came  to  pass  that  the  voter  never  prepared  his  own 
ballot  paper,  but  merely  used  the  printed  sheet,  or  slate,  of 
candidates  handed  out  by  party  agents.  If  he  wished  to 
depart  from  this  list,  he  erased  one  or  more  names  and  wrote 
in  others,  a  procedure  known  as  "scratching"  a  ballot. 
This  was  the  ballot  system  which  remained  in  vogue  through- 
out the  cities  of  the  United  States  until  about  twenty-five 
years  ago. 

The  system  was,  however,  open  to  many  serious  objec- 
tions. It  was  the  custom  of  party  organizations  to  provide 
ballot  papers  which,  from  their  color  or  form,  could  be  recog- 
nized even  when  folded,  so  that  secrecy  of  voting  was  prac- 
tically destroyed.  Furthermore,  a  heavy  premium  was  put 
upon  voting  a  straight  party  ticket ;  the  voter  who  wished 
to  depart  from  the  regular  slate  could  do  so  only  with  some 
trouble  to  himself.  All  this  facilitated  trickery  of  various 
sorts;  for,  with  an  unlimited  number  of  ballot  papers  in 
circulation  about  the  polling-booth,  the  ordinary  securities 
against  ballot-switching,  the  stuffing  of  ballot-boxes,  and 
kindred  frauds  were  impaired.  The  system  also  gave  a 
great  advantage  to  the  regular,  or  organization,  candidates, 
and  served  to  discourage  independent  candidacy. 

It  was  because  of  this  that  a  movement  began,  in  the 
later  eighties,  for  the  adoption  of  the  so-termed  Australian 
ballot.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  there  was  nothing  exclusively 
Australian  about  the  new  ballot ;  although  it  originated 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        143 

there,  it  was  merely  the  ballot  used  in  England  since  1872, 
and  in  all  the  self-governing  English  colonies.  The  dis- 
tinguishing characteristic  of  this  ballot  lies,  not  in  its  size 
or  shape  or  arrangement,  but  merely  in  the  fact  that  it  is 
printed  officially  at  the  public  expense,  whereas  under  the 
older  system  ballots  were  printed  either  by  or  on  behalf 
of  the  candidates  at  their  own  cost.  The  "Australian" 
ballots,  being  official,  bear  the  names  of  all  the  candidates, 
whether  put  forward  by  organizations  or  otherwise;  they 
are  printed  under  close  official  supervision  in  limited  numbers, 
are  supplied  to  each  polling-booth  for  the  use  of  voters,  and 
must  all  be  accounted  for  when  the  voting  is  over.  Their 
use  insures  absolute  secrecy,  and  affords  some  security 
against  fraudulent  practices.1 

But  this  ballot  soon  developed  in  America  a  form  utterly  Ballot 
unlike  its  prototype  in  Australia.2  Since  there  were  many 
municipal  officers  to  be  elected,  and  since  the  various  parties 
continued  to  put  whole  slates  of  candidates  in  nomination, 
it  became  customary  to  arrange  in  columns,  according  to 
their  party  affiliations,  the  names  of  all  the  candidates  on 
the  ballot.  Then  came  the  habit  of  putting  at  the  head  of 
each  column  a  party  symbol,  and  below  this  a  circle  in 
which,  by  making  a  single  cross,  a  voter  could  record  his 
vote  for  the  score  or  more  of  candidates  whose  names  were 
printed  in  the  column  underneath.  The  original  Australian 
ballot  had  none  of  these  things.  The  party  column,  the^ 


emblem^  and  the  circle  are  all   features   that   have   been. 
engrafted  upon  it  in  America  by  the  influence  of  party  organ- 

1  P.  L.  Allen,  "Ballot  Laws  and  their  Workings,"  in  Political  Science 
Quarterly,  XXI.  38  (March,  1906).     On  the  movement  for  the  introduc- 
tion of  the  Australian  ballot  in  America,  see  J.  H.  Wigmore,  The  Australian 
Ballot  System  (Boston,  1889). 

2  The  great  variety  of  regulations  adopted  by  the  various  states  in 
regard  to  the  form  of  the  ballot  may  be  seen  in  the  summary  of  "Ballot 
Laws  in  the  United  States,"  by  Arthur  Ludington,  in  American  Political 
Science  Review,  III.  252-261  (May,  1909). 


144  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

izations  which  desired  to  hold  their  grip  upon  the  voters  and 
to  place  deterrents  in  the  way  of  political  independence. 
The  long  As  a  result  of  this  development,  the  ballot,  though  made 
secret,  was  not  made  intelligible.  The  premium  upon 
straight  voting  still  remained.  The  party  designation  of 
candidates  represented  a  direct  appeal  to  the  partisan  alle- 
giance of  voters.  The  number  of  names  upon  the  ballot, 
as  used  in  large  cities,  rendered  it  impossible  for  the  average 
voter  to  make  intelligent  selections ;  and  the  arrangement  of 
the  names  was  such  as  to  penalize  him  with  extra  trouble, 
as  well  as  with  the  risk  of  spoiling  his  ballot,  if  he  displayed 
any  political  independence.  To  vote  a  straight  party 
ticket  was  made  easy,  —  a  single  cross  accomplished  that ; 
but  it  sometimes  required  the  marking  of  fifty  or  more 
crosses  to  vote  a  split  ticket.  Thus  it  was  that,  despite  the 
changed  character  of  the  ballot,  party  organizations  con- 
tinued to  hold  most  of  the  advantages  which  they  had 
Removal  acquired  under  the  former  system.  The  next  step  in  the 
design^  direction  of  ballot  reform  came  with  a  movement  for  the 
tions.  abolition  of  the  party  column  and  the  grouping  of  all  candi- 

dates under  the  particular  offices  to  which  they  aspired. 
Massachusetts,  in  1888,  had  adopted  a  ballot  of  this  type, 
which  bore  no  party  emblem  and  forced  the  voter  to  mark 
separately  his  choice  for  each  office.  This  was  an  improve- 
ment; but  a  partisan  designation  still  followed  each  name 
on  the  ballot,  and  the  great  mass  of  voters  continued  to 
accept  this  as  their  sole  guide.  The  Massachusetts  ballot 
performed  a  good  service,  however,  in  paving  the  way  for 
the  dropping  of  partisan  designations  altogether,  and  the 
amended  Boston  charter  of  1909  marked  the  first  application 
of  the  new  principle  to  the  elections  of  a  large  American  city.1 

1  Municipal  ballots  without  party  designations  were,  however,  already 
in  use  by  some  smaller  cities  that  had  adopted  the  commission  form  of 
government. 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        145 

Since  then  the  ballot  without  party  designations  has  found 
favor  in  many  cities  of  the  United  States ;  in  other  words, 
the  Australian  ballot  in  its  original  uncomplicated  form 
is  now  for  the  first  time  obtaining  a  fair  trial  in  this 
country. 

But  the  mere  removal  of  party  designations  from  the  The  ballot's 
municipal  ballot  is  not  likely  to  be  of  much  avail  in  promoting  burden- 
independent  and  intelligent  voting  unless  other  changes  go 
along  with  it.  If  the  voter  is  expected  to  use  discrimination 
in  marking  his  ballot,  the  ballot  itself  must  be  shortened  to  a 
point  at  wmcn  a  lair  scrutiny  of  the  claims  ol  eacn  candidate 
is  not  beyond  his  patience.  A  ballot  which  bears  twenty 
names  or  more  is  too  long  for  practical  scrutiny ;  the  average 
voter  will  pay  attention  to  the  candidates  for  a  few  of  the 
most  conspicuous  offices  only.1  The  others  he  will  vote 
for,  either  according  to  the  party  label  which  they  bear, 
or  according  to  some  other  rule  which  does  not  require  any 
careful  study  of  candidates  on  his  own  part.  To  say  this 
is  in  no  way  to  reflect  either  upon  the  intelligence  or  upon 
the  civic  spirit  of  the  ordinary  voter.  It  means  only  that 
there  is  something  wrong  with  an  electoral  system  which 
requires  from  every  man  a  service  that  not  one  in  ten 
thousand  is  willing  to  give.  It  is  idle  to  urge  that  all  munici- 
pal offices  might  be  capably  filled  by  election  if  the  voters 
would  perform  their  duty.  If  it  be  made  the  duty  of  the 
voter  to  constitute  himself  a  committee  of  investigation  at 
every  election,  he  will  not  perform  that  duty,  nor  will  any 
amount  of  political  sermonizing  induce  him  to  do  it.  This 
being  the  case,  it  becomes  the  part  of  wisdom  not  to  put 
any  such  burden  upon  him.  To  this  end,  the  number  of 

1  Ballots  containing  three  or  four  hundred  names  have  not  been  at  all 
uncommon  at  state  and  national  elections.  The  record  for  unwieldiness 
appears  to  be  held  by  a  ballot  used  in  the  thirty-second  assembly  district 
of  New  York  State  a  few  years  ago.  It  contained  the  jsiames  of  835 
candidates. 


146  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

elective  offices  should  be  reduced  to  a  minimum;  the  out- 
standing offices,  those  which  from  their  nature  carry  large 
powers  and  attract  wide  attention,  must  of  course  be  filled 
by  popular  action,  but  there  the  task  of  the  voter  ought  to 
cease.  It  is  well  enough  for  politicians  to  dilate  upon  the 
"educative  value  of  a  system  under  which  all  officers  of 
government  are  elected,"  or  upon  the  "  antagonism  between 
executive  appointments  and  popular  sovereignty";  but  the 
downright  folly  of  requiring  voters  to  go  through  the  pre- 
tence of  doing  what  they  cannot  and  will  not  do  is  too  patent 
to  be  permanently  tolerated.  The  blanket  ballot  has  been 
the  political  jobber's  device  for  imposing  upon  the  voter  a 
hollow  mockery  of  popular  sovereignty  which  has  served 
to  shield  from  his  eyes  the  real  existence  of  a  political  oli- 
garchy. Popular  sovereignty  demands  that  the  voter  shall 
do  more  than  go  through  the  form  of  selecting  his  represent- 
atives. To  have  any  educative  value  whatever  the 
electoral  system  must  make  it  practicable  for  him  to  do 
more  than  execute  a  perfunctory  service  at  the  polls.  "  No 
plan  of  government  is  a  democracy  unless  on  actual  trial 
it  proves  to  be  one.  The  fact  that  those  who  planned  it 
intended  it  to  be  a  democracy  and  could  argue  that  it  would 
be  one  if  the  people  only  would  do  thus  and  so,  proves 
nothing." 1  If  it  is  not  a  democracy  in  fact,  it  ought  not 
to  bear  the  name. 

The  short  It  is  not  enough,  moreover,  to  have  the  ballot  small  and 
the  names  upon  it  few.  No  matter  how  scant  the  number 
of  names,  the  voters  will  not  rouse  themselves  to  any  intelli- 
gent part  in  the  election  if  none  but  unimportant  offices  are 
to  be  filled.  The  ballot  should  bear,  therefore,  the  names 
of  those  only  who  are  candidates  for  such  municipal  offices 

1  R.  S.  Childs,  Short  Ballot  Principles  (Boston,  1911),  19.  This  little 
book  may  be  commended  to  readers  as  a  trenchant  and  colorful  state- 
ment of  the  case  for  ballot  reform. 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        147 

as  bulk  large  in  the  public  imagination,  —  the  posts  of 
mayor,  comptroller,  and  members  of  the  city  council,  if  the 
latter  body  be  not  too  large.  It  is  also  highly  desirable 
that  a  place  upon  the  ballot  be  within  the  reach  of  candi- 
dates who  have  no  party  organizations  behind  them.  This 
can  be  achieved  to  some  extent  by  the  elimination  of  all 
party  designations  from  the  ballot,  but  more  effectively 
by  the  establishment  of  a  system  under  which  voters  will 
indicate,  not  merely  their  first  choice  for  an  office,  but  their 
second  and  perhaps  their  third  choice  as  well. 

The  aim  of  the  ballot  ought  to  be,  in  a  word,  to  extract  from  The  pref- 
the  voter,  not  merely  a  part  of  his  judgment  in  regard  to  the 
list  of  names  set  before  him,  but  the  whole  of  it.  A  ballot 
that  asks  the  voter  to  designate  only  his  first  choice  solicits 
a  partial  judgment  only.  Voters  ought,  therefore,  when- 
ever possible,  to  be  asked  for  an  expression  of  their  opinions 
concerning  two  or  more  of  the  candidates  on  the  ballot, 
which  means  that  some  variety  of  the  so-termed  "preferen- 
tial" ballot  may  well  be  employed  when  tfrfi  pumber  of  elec- 
tive office^  fp  *m*i\  pnmigh  to  pprnnit  its  nsp.  The  prefer- 
ential ballot  is  in  form  and  arrangement  simpler  than  the  bal- 
lot commonly  used  in  American  municipal  elections.  The 
names  of  candidates  are  printed  upon  it  in  a  column,  in  an 
order  determined  either  alphabetically  or  by  lot;  but, 
instead  of  the  single  column  in  which  the  voter  ordinarily 
marks  a  cross  to  designate  his  selection,  there  are  three 
vertical  columns,  in  which  he  is  asked  to  record  his  first, 
second,  and  other  choices  respectively.  He  indicates  his 
first  choice  just  as  he  would  in  using  the  ordinary  Australian 
ballot ;  in  the  second  column  he  puts  a  cross  opposite  the 
name  of  the  candidate  whom  he  wishes  to  mark  as  his  second 
choice ;  and  in  the  third  column  he  indicates  all  the  candi- 
dates (apart  from  the  two  already  designated)  to  whom  he 
is  not  definitely  opposed,  —  in  other  words,  all  those  whom  he 


148 


GOVERNMENT   OP  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Method  of 
counting. 


Advantages 
claimed 
for  the 


would  deem  worthy  of  his  support  were  his  first  and  second 
favorites  out  of  the  running.  The  names  of  those  candidates 
whom  he  would  not  care  to  support  under  any  circumstances 
he  leaves  unmarked. 

When  preferential  ballots,  marked  in  this  way,  are  counted 
up  and  some  candidate  is  shown  to  have  a  clear  majority 
of  first  choices,  that  candidate  is  declared  elected.  In  that 
event  the  outcome  of  the  balloting  under  the  preferential 
system  would  differ  in  no  way  from  that  in  which  the  ordi- 
nary ballot  is  employed.  If  no  candidate  secures  a  clear 
majority  of  first  choices,  the  second  choices  marked  for 
each  candidate  are  added  to  their  first  choices ;  and  the  one 
who  scores  highest  in  this  addition  wins,  provided  he  proves 
to  have  a  clear  majority  of  all  the  first  and  second  choices 
taken  together.  If  no  candidate  has  this,  the  preferences 
indicated  in  the  third  column  are  added  to  the  totals  already 
recorded  for  each  candidate ;  and  the  highest  wins,  whether 
he  has  a  majority  or  not. 

Various  advantages  are  claimed  for  this  system,  which 
substantially  in  the  form  outlined  by  the  preceding  para- 
graph has  been  in  operation  in  Grand  Junction,  Colorado,  and 
in  Spokane,  Washington,  during  the  last  two  or  three  years. 
It  dispenses  with  all  complicated  nomination  machinery,  obvi- 
ating the  necessity  of  conventions  or  primaries  as  agencies  for 
weeding  out  all  but  a  few  leading  candidates.  It  permits 
practically  any  voter  to  have  his  name  put  on  the  ballot, 
for  even  a  considerable  list  of  names  does  not  impede  the 
working  of  the  system.  It  moreovej^ejicourages  indepen- 
dent/candidatures, since  it  affords  an  opportunity  of  election 
to  the  man  who  has  no  strong  personal  following^  but  is 
rpprfl.rHpH  wjt.H  moderate  fa.vnr  hy 


^ 

It  serves  to  prevent  what  is  a  very  frequent  outcome  of 
three-cornered  campaigns  under  the  ordinary  balloting 
system,  —  the  election  of  any  candidate  who  is  clearly  the 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        149 

selection  of  a  minority.1  There  are,  of  course,  some  objec- 
tions to  the  system,  chief  of  which  is  the  possibility  that 
many  voters  would  find  it  so  hard  to  understand  that 
spoiled  ballots  would  be  numerous  ;  but  the  preferential 
ballot  seems  to  have  given  satisfaction  in  the  two  cities  in 
which  it  has  been  on  trial,  and  it  ought  to  have  an  oppor- 
tunity to  demonstrate  its  serviceability  on  a  wider  scale. 
Anything  which  offers  a  promise  of  getting  rid  of  the  cum- 
brous American  nomination  machinery  is  indeed  to  be 
welcomed.2 

When  the  ordinary  ballot  bears  no  party  designations^  order  of 
it  is  likely,  unless  it  be  very  short,  to  give  a  marked  advan-  names- 
ta^e  to  those  candidates  whose  names  appear  near  the  top 
of  the  list.  To  provide  that  names  shall  appear  in  alpha- 
betical order  is  to  put  a  handicap  upon  those  candidates 
whose  names  begin  with  letters  well  down  in  the  alphabet ; 
to  put  names  on  the  ballot  according  to  the  order  in  which 
the  nomination  papers  are  filed  is  to  encourage  an  unseemly 
scramble  when  the  hour  for  filing  arrives.  Hence  the  se- 
quence of  names  is  in  many  places  decided  by  lot,  a  device 
which  merely  transfers  the  advantage  to  the  candidates  who 
happen  to  draw  the  lucky  numbers,  but  which,  by  giving 
an  equal  chance  to  all,  is  somewhat  better  than  the  other 
plans.  Some  cities  believe  that  they  have  found  a  satis- 
factory solution  in  an  arrangement  whereby  _the  names 
on  the  ballot  are  revolved  alphabetically.  —  that  is  to  say, 

1  At   a  recent   municipal   election   in  Massachusetts   the   candidate 
chosen  to  the  office  of  mayor  received  only  about  1800  out  of  nearly  7200 
votes  cast ;   the  remaining  5400  were  divided  almost  equally  among  four 
other  candidates. 

2  For  further  discussions  of  the  preferential-ballot  system,   see   the 
article  by  R.  M.  Hull  on  "  Preferential  Voting  and  How  it  Works,"  in 
National  Municipal  Review,  I.  386-400  (July,  1912)  ;  the  summary  given 
by  Robert  Tyson  in  C.  A.  Beard's  Digest  of  Short  Ballot  Charters  (New 
York,  1911) ;  and  the  brief  account  printed  in  E.  S.  Bradford's  Commission 
Government  in  American  Cities  (New  York,  1911),  100-103 ;  258-261. 


150  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

an  arrangement  under  which,  if  there  are  five  candidates,  for 
example,  each  of  them  will  have  his  name  at  the  top  of  one- 
fifth  of  all  the  ballots.  Just  how  much  advantage  comes 
from  occupying  the  first  place  on  the  ballot  depends  upon  a 
variety  of  circumstances,  including  the  make-up  of  the 
ballot  itself;  but  practical  politicians  esteem  the  place 
to  be  highly  important.1 

Securities  A  final  consideration  affecting  municipal  elections  lies  in 
comlpt  the  degree  of  security  afforded  against  corrupt  and  unfair 
practices.  From  the  beginnings  of  American  municipal 
history,  all  offences  that  are  by  nature  culpable,  such  as 
personation,  intimidation,  bribery,  tampering  with  ballots, 
and  falsifying  returns,  have  been  punishable  under  the 
rules  of  common  law.  It  is  only  within  the  last  quarter- 
century,  however,  that  many  practices  which  do  not  involve 
moral  turpitude,  but  which  nevertheless  contribute  to  make 
an  election  undignified,  unfair,  or  unduly  expensive,  have 
been  forbidden  by  statute.  These  statutes,  modelled  in 
general  upon  the  English  "Corrupt  and  Illegal  Practices 
Prevention  Act"  of  1883  and  the  amending  act  of  1895 
(46-57  Victoria,  c.  51,  and  58-59  Victoria,  c.  40)  have  been 
applied  to  city  elections  in  many  states  of  the  Union.2 
Their  provisions  vary  considerably  from  state  to  state, 
but  in  the  main  they  not  o^lv  provide  severe  penalties  for 

bribery  f  illegal  •"'Vtiinni    QTW*  iT^jy^rUfi'™^   hnf.  mrjfajn  ^larK^ 

limiting  the  sources  from    which    campaign    contributions 

1  Some  idea  of  the  value  which  politicians  attach  to  possession  of  the 
first  place  on  the  ballot  may  be  gained  from  the  action  of  a  candidate 
for  election  to  the  board  of  aldermen  in  a  Massachusetts  city,  who  recently 
secured  from  the  probate  court  authority  to  change  his  name  so  that  it 
would  begin  with  the  first  letter  of  the  alphabet. 

1  A  digest  of  these  laws  is  printed  in  Comparative  Legislation  Bulletin, 
No.  23  ("Corrupt  Practices  at  Elections  "),  issued  by  the  Wisconsin  Free 
Library  Commission  in  1911.  See  also  the  Report  of  the  Commission  on 
Laws  relating  to  .  .  .  Corrupt  Practices  at  Elections  made  to  the  General 
Assembly  of  Connecticut  (Bridgeport,  1907). 


MUNICIPAL  NOMINATIONS  AND   ELECTIONS        151 

may  be  received^  designating  the  purposes  for  which  such 
funds  may  be  spent,  and  requiring  publicity  in  both  cases. 
Not  infrequently  they  forbid  the  taking  of  contributions 
from  corporations.  As  to  purposes  for  which  funds  may  be 
spent,  the  laws  sometimes  set  forth  a  list  of  things  which  may 
not  be  paid  for,  as,  for  example,  conveyances,  hired  can- 
vassers, and  the  treating  of  voters ;  in  other  cases  they  name 
in  detail  the  objects  for  which  money  may  legitimately  be 
used,  as  printing,  rent  of  halls,  travelling,  etc.,  and  forbid 
it  to  be  spent  for  any  other  purpose.  Special  restrictions 
are  sometimes  imposed  upon  advertising ;  in  several  states, 
for  instance,  all  campaign  advertisements  must  be  signed 
by  the  voter  who  causes  their  publication.  Some  states 
require  the  appointment  of  party  treasurers,  through 
whom  all  contributions  and  expenditures  must  be  made; 
and  the  practice  of  insisting  upon  the  filing  of  a  statement 
showing  all  the  receipts  and  expenditures  connected  with  an 
election  has  developed  rapidly  in  recent  years.  In  many 
cases,  to  be  sure,  statutes  have  proved  defective  or  have 
been  too  easily  evaded;  but  they  have  nevertheless  done 
much  to  improve  the  tone  and  temper  of  elections,  both 
state  and  municipal.  Even  if  dishonest  and  unfair  practices 
at  American  city  elections  are  not  yet  wholly  things  of  the 
past,  the  situation  is  vastly  better  to-day  than  it  was  two 
decades  ago. 

REFERENCES 

The  most  profitable  selected  list  of  materials  relating  to  nominating 
methods  is  that  given  in  the  appendix  of  C.  E.  Merriam's  Primary  Elec- 
tions (2d  ed.,  Chicago,  1909).  This  volume  also  contains  an  admirable 
re'sume'  of  the  whole  subject.  Special  mention  should  also  be  made  of 
G.  D.  Luetscher's  Early  Political  Machinery  in  the  United  States  (Phila- 
delphia, 1903) ;  F.  W.  Dallinger's  Nominations  for  Elective  Office  in  the 
United  States  (New  York,  1897) ;  and  E.  C.  Meyer's  Nominating  Systems 
(Madison,  1902).  References  to  laws  that  have  been  passed  since  these 
books  were  written  may  be  found  in  the  quarterly  summaries  of  current 
legislation  printed  in  the  American  Political  Science  Review.  The  Report 


152  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

of  the  Joint  Committee  of  the  Senate  and  Assembly  of  the  State  of  New  York 
(Albany,  1910)  contains  a  great  deal  of  interesting  evidence  in  regard  to 
the  working  of  nominating  systems  in  various  states,  although  the  find- 
ings of  the  committee  bear  obvious  marks  of  unfairness.  A  group  of 
interesting  articles  on  direct  primaries  appeared  in  the  annual  Proceed- 
ings of  the  American  Political  Science  Association  for  1910;  and  atten- 
tion should  be  called  to  Professor  Ford's  thoughtful  essay  on  the  direct 
primary  in  the  North  American  Review  for  July,  1909.  See  also  the 
volume  entitled  Selected  Articles  on  Direct  Primaries,  ed.  C.  E.  Fanning, 
in  the  Debaters'  Handbook  Series  (Minneapolis,  1911). 

On  the  registration  of  voters  and  the  machinery  of  municipal  elections, 
the  following  are  useful  sources  of  information :  G.  W.  McCrary,  Treatise 
on  the  American  Law  of  Elections  (Chicago,  1897) ;  C.  F.  Bishop,  History 
of  Elections  in  the  American  Colonies  (New  York,  1893) ;  J.  H.  Wigmore, 
Australian  Ballot  System  (Boston,  1889) ;  R.  S.  Childs,  Short  Ballot  Prin- 
ciples (Boston,  1911);  P.  L.  Allen,  "Ballot  Laws  and  their  Workings,'' 
in  Political  Science  Quarterly,  XXI.  38;  Arthur  Ludington,  "Ballot 
Laws  in  the  United  States,"  in  American  Political  Science  Review,  III. 
252;  C.  A.  Beard,  "The  Ballot's  Burden,"  ibid.,  XXIV.  589;  and  R.  M. 
Hull,  "Preferential  Voting  and  How  it  Works,"  in  National  Municipal 
Review,  I.  386-400  (July,  1912 ;  printed  in  somewhat  different  form  in 
Twentieth  Century  Magazine,  v.  49-56,  April,  1912).  Some  interest- 
ing discussions  of  ballot  laws  and  corrupt  practices  at  elections  are 
reprinted  in  C.  L.  Jones's  Readings  on  Parties  and  Elections  (New  York, 
1912),  206-334.  On  the  safeguards  against  corrupt  and  illegal  prac- 
tices at  elections,  a  summary  of  legislation  and  a  list  of  books  deal- 
ing with  the  subject  are  given  in  the  bulletin  of  the  Wisconsin  Free  Li- 
brary Commission  on  "Corrupt  Practices  at  Elections"  (February,  1911). 
Much  information  may  also  be  found  in  Report  of  the  Commission  on  Laws 
relating  to  .  .  .  Corrupt  Practices  at  Elections  made  to  the  General  Assem- 
bly of  Connecticut,  January,  1907.  The  parent  English  law,  with  notes 
and  comments,  is  in  E.  A.  Jelf's  Corrupt  and  Illegal  Practices  Prevention 
Acts  of  1883  and  1895  (3d  ed.,  London,  1905) ;  and  a  discussion  of  the 
way  in  which  the  English  system  operates  may  be  found  in  A.  L.  Lowell's 
Government  of  England  (2  vols.,  New  York,  1908).  The  general  subject 
of  sinister  practices  in  American  politics  is  dealt  with  comprehensively 
in  Professor  R.  C.  Brooks's  Corruption  in  American  Politics  and  Life 
(New  York,  1911). 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND   POLITICS 

HAVING  considered,  in  the  two  preceding  chapters,  the  Political 
way  in  which  the  electorate  is  constituted  and  the  channels  par 
through  which  it  puts  forth  its  power,  one  encounters  the 
task  of  discussing  an  important  branch  of  municipal  science 
that  is  not  by  any  means  so  well  understood,  —  namely, 
the  system  whereby  groups  of  voters  seek  to  make  them- 
selves the  exponents  of  the  whole  electoral  will.  These 
group  organizations,  or  political  parties,  serve  not  only  ta 
afford  rallying-grounds  for  voters  who  share  the  same  gen- 
eral opinions,  but  also  to  provide  centripetal  forces  in  the 
moulding  of  public  policy.  All  sound  and  stable  repre- 
sentative government  is  party  government.  Were  it  not, 
indeed,  for  the  focussing  influence  of  partisan  organization, 
whether  in  nation,  state,  or  city,  it  would  be  impossible  to 
formulate  clear  policies,  or  to  develop  real  responsibility, 
or  to  establish  sound  traditions  of  government. 

The  division  of  citizens  into  rival  parties  is  a  natural  Why  they 
outcome  of  the  simple  fact  that  in  matters  pertaining  to  the 
body  politic  they  do  not  all  think  alike,  or  yet  all  think  dif- 
ferently. If  they  did  either  of  these  things,  political  parties 
could  not  exist.  Whatever  his  opinions  on  public  questions, 
a  man  will  always  get  some  of  his  fellows  to  agree  with  him ; 
and  the  more  meritorious  his  opinions,  the  larger,  presumably, 
will  be  the  company  in  which  he  finds  himself .  Political  par- 
ties are  merely  groups  of  partisans,  of  men  who  think  alike, 
or  profess  to  think  alike,  upon  questions  of  the  day.  They 
are  the  sects  of  statecraft.  It  is  through  them  that  indi- 

153 


154 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Identifica- 
tion of 
political 
parties  in 
the  various 
realms  of 
govern- 
ment. 


Effects  of 
this  identi- 
fication. 


vidual  opinions  are  combined  into  a  political  consensus. 
In  this  alone  lies  their  explanation  and  their  justification. 

Since  parties  are  built  upon  variety  and  unity  of  political 
opinion,  they  should  be,  and  usually  profess  to  be,  related 
to  issues  of  public  policy.  And  since  such  questions  are  not 
the  same  in  the  three  realms  of  government,  national,  state, 
and  municipal,  the  logical  outcome  of  partisan  philosophy 
would  be  the  evolution  of  three  sets  of  political  parties,  each 
adjusting  itself  to  the  issues  of  its  particular  realm.  Such 
ia  noj.  thft  actual  situation,  however.  The  voters  of  the 
United  States  have  ranged  themselves  into  two  or  three 
great  groups  which  retain  their  cohesion  in  all  spheres  of 
government,  irrespective  of  the  fact  that  the  problems  in  one 
sphere  have  no  relation  to  those  in  another.  In  the  American 
city,  therefore,  the  voters  are  cleft  into  groups,  not  by  any 
local  point  of  difference,  but  by  a  line  of  cleavage  drawn  down 
from  the  politics  of  state  and  nation.  It  is  this  identifica- 
tion of  party  lines  in  state  and  city  that  has  demoralized 
municipal  politics  almost  everywhere  by  preventing  the_ 
voters  from  getting  face  to  face  with  issues  that  concern, 
their  own  immediate  neighborhood. 

The  municipal  party  organization,  accordingly,  can  rarely 
be  studied  in  isolation ;  it  is  usually  no  more  than  one  of  the 
wheels  in  the  greater  partisan  machine  which  operates  in 
state  politics.  This  subordination  of  city  to  state  in  the 
machinery  of  party  organization  is,  so  far  as  its  effects  go, 
a  flagrant  violation  of  the  doctrine  of  municipal  home  rule ; 
and  its  results  have  been  more  pernicious  to  city  administra- 
tion than  many  of  those  legislative  infringements  upon  civic 
autonomy  against  which  municipal  politicians  cry  out  so 
lustily.  Indeed,  it  is  a  curious  fact  that  those  city  politicians 
who  are  most  uncompromising  in  their  opposition  to  legisla- 
tive interference  in  city  affairs  are  the  very  ones  who  often 
submit  most  tamely  to  the  domination  of  municipal  politics 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND   POLITICS  155 

by  a  state-party  machine.  Yet  it  cannot  be  denied  that  its  relation 
one  form  of  outside  domination  has  as  little  justification  as 
the  other.  The  intimacy  which  so  often  exists  between  the  rule' 
party  organizations  in  state  and  city  means  almost  inevi- 
tably that  adherents  of  the  party  in  the  city  are  exploited 
for  the  advantage  of  the  party  in  the  state ;  or,  if  the  spoils 
which  become  available  through  the  control  of  city  govern- 
ment be  greater  (as  is  the  case  in  cities  like  New  York, 
Chicago,  and  Philadelphia),  the  situation  will  be  reversed 
and  the  interests  of  the  party  in  the  state  will  be  sacrificed. 
Wherever  the  spoils  of  victory  promise  to  be  in  greater 
abundance,  there  the  energies  of  the  two  machines  will  be 
concentrated. 

As  a  means  of  remedying  this  evil  three  plans  have  been  Methods  of 
tried.  Some  cities  have  sought  to  get  rid  of  all  party  or- 
ganization  in  municipal  politics.  To  this  end  they  have 
abolished  the  political  convention  and  the  party  primary, 
substituting  either  the  nonpartisan  primary  or  nomina- 
tion by  petition.  They  have  likewise  removed  all  desig- 
nations from  the  election  ballot,  and  have  tried  to  destroy 
the  chief  props  of  partisan  rivalry  by  putting  municipal  i.  Abolition 
offices  under  civil-service  rules  and  by  taking  contract 
awards  out  of  the  realm  of  political  influence.  All  this  has 
served  to  weaken,  if  it  has  not  destroyed,  the  hold  of  organi- 
zations upon  the  electorate.  But  it  may  well  be  asked 
whether  attempts  to  abolish  all  electoral  organization  in 
municipal  politics  do  not  result  from  a  failure  to  realize  the 
true  function  of  parties  and  the  real  service  which  properly- 
based  political  associations  can  render  to  the  community. 
To  formulate  and  to  set  before  the  whole  electorate  opinions 
that  are  held  in  common  by  a  portion  of  it,  to  impress  the 
merit  of  these  opinions  by  concerted  effort  upon  the  whole 
body  of  voters,  to  afford  a  means  whereby  responsibility 
for  a  policy  shall  be  borne  in  common  by  all  who  advocate 


156 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


2.  Creation 
of  strictly 
municipal 
parties. 


it,  —  these  appear  to  be  the  true  functions  of  a  political 
party,  and  they  are  services  needed  in  the  city  quite  as  much 
as  elsewhere.  So  long,  therefore,  as  there  are  opinions  to 
be  formulated,  ends  to  be  achieved  in  concert,  and  respon-_ 
sibilities  to  he  effectively  shouldered,  we  are  not  likely  to  get 
rid  of  the  best  affpp™^  y^tr  dpvised  for  accomplishing  these. 


results.1  To  suggest  that  the  American  municipal  voter 
can  best  perform  his  civic  duties  without  cooperation  and 
guidance  is  to  disregard  the  plain  fact  that  his  need  for 
both  these  things  was  never  so  pressing  as  it  is  to-day,  by 
reason  of  the  complex  nature  of  the  task  which  he  is  asked 
to  perform  at  the  polls  in  passing  upon  measures  as  well  as 
upon  men. 

Taking  it  for  granted  that  the  forces  which  make  for 
organized  electoral  action  are  not  likely  to  grow  weaker,  and 
that  parties  of  some  sort  will  therefore  probably  keep  com- 
ing into  action  no  matter  what  formal  changes  may  be  made 
in  municipal  machinery,  other  cities  have  undertaken  to 
encourage  the  development  of  strictly  municipal  parties  _ 
which  relate  their  propaganda  solely  to  local  questions  and 
have  at  most  only  an  incidental  connection  with  the  party 
organizations  of  state  or  nation.  This  is  a  policy  which 
seems  on  its  face  to  be  not  only  logical  but  easily  carried  to 
success.  Few  men  will  quarrel  with  you  when  you  urge 
that  there  is  no  reasonable  connection  between  local  and 
state  issues,  and  that  to  drag  the  latter  into  the  arena  of 
municipal  politics  serves  no  useful  purpose  in  either  field 
of  government.  Nor  will  you  provoke  dissent  by  asserting 
that,  because  a  political  party  enunciates  in  its  platform 
sound  canons  of  policy  concerning  the  tariff  or  the  currency, 
it  thereby  acquires  no  right  to  control  the  appointment  of 
police  commissioners  or  the  award  of  municipal  contracts. 


1  M.  R.  Maltbie,  "Municipal  Political  Parties,"  in  Proceedings  of  the 
National  Municipal  League,  1900,  pp.  226-238. 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND   POLITICS  157 

The  wisest  disposition  of  purely  municipal  questions  can 
come  only  from  a  consideration  of  the  factors  directly  in- 
volved, and  matters  of  national  politics  are  not  involved 
even  remotely.  On  all  these  things  most  men  are  agreed; 
yet  agreement  in  the  premises  has  not  served  to  bring  about 
very  much  in  the  way  of  results.  There  have  been  strictly 
municipal  parties  in  American  cities  from  time  to  time.  In 
a  later  chapter  something  is  said  concerning  their  achieve- 
ments and  failures,  but  more,  unfortunately,  about  the 
latter  than  the  former.1  Such  parties  have  been  sporadic 
in  appearance,  and  rarely  have  survived  a  second  municipal 
campaign.  Coming  into  the  field  of  municipal  politics  with 
much  ado  and  clatter,  they  have  usually  gathered  to  them- 
selves all  the  elements  of  local  discontent,  and  not  uncom-  Thehandi- 
monly  have  acquired  thereby  sufficient  momentum  to  seat  {^  party, 
their  candidates  in  office.  But  the  unity  of  malcontents  is 
precarious.  Since  the  new  party  can  hold  its  diverse  ele- 
ments only  by  satisfying  all,  it  is  sure  to  find  the  ensuing 
factional  discord  fatal  to  the  success  of  its  candidates  at 
the  next  election.  A  new  party,  whatever  the  principle 
upon  which  it  is  based,  carries  a  further  handicap :  its  plat- 
form or  programme  must,  if  it  is  to  gain  the  public  ear  and 
attention,  contain  some  striking  features  not  to  be  found 
in  the  platforms  of  the  existing  parties.  But  most  things 
that  are  feasible  and  at  the  same  time  popular  have  already 
been  gathered  into  these  programmes  by  the  shrewd  men 
who  formulated  them.  Accordingly,  the  new  party  is  cer- 
tain to  start  out  with  a  list  of  aims  which,  if  popular,  are 
not  practicable,  or  if  practicable  are  not  popular^  Being 
made  up  chiefly  of  men  who  have  strong  views  as  to  what 
is  right  and  wrong,  it  is  apt  to  have  a  rigid  and  uncom- 
promising platform  which  too  often  repels  by  its  vigor  and 
intensity  of  expression,  thereby  offsetting  what  it  gains  by 
1  See  below,  ch.  xiv. 


158  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

its  appeal  to  the  local  patriotism  of  voters.  Each  charter 
member  of  a  new  municipal  party  is  more  likely  than  not  to 
be  wedded  to  some  specific  reform  which  has  become  a 
hobby  with  him,  and  which  he  will  ride  into  the  party  plat- 
form if  he  can.  The  new  programme  thus  becomes  too  often 
an  odd  mosaic  of  individual  fads,  many  of  which  are  sure 
to  prove  utterly  irreconcilable  in  actual  opera/Hon. 
New  parties  These  two  features  —  the  inharmonious  nature  of  the 
ihTe?0'  elements  that  ordinarily  constitute  the  nucleus  of  a  new 
municipal  party,  and  the  almost  inevitable  shortcomings 
of  the  programme  which  it  formulates  —  do  not,  of  course, 
prevent  the  frequent  appearance  of  such  parties,  nor  do  they 
always  prevent  the  party's  initial  success  at  the  polls.  They 
do,  however,  preclude  sustained  success,  and  they  explain 
in  large  measure  why  the  mortality  rate  among  municipal 
parties  is  so  high.  To  speak  after  the  manner  of  actuaries, 
the  normal  expectation  of  life  among  such  parties,  as 
based  upon  a  wealth  of  experience  during  the  last  quarter- 
century,  is  not  more  than  a  half-dozen  years  at  most,  — 
an  inevitable  result,  so  long  as  these  organizations  acquire 
at  birth  the  germs  of  their  own  speedy  dissolution.  Al- 
though such  imperfections  may  not  on  their  face  seem  to  be 
ineradicable,  yet  in  attempts  to  remove  them  no  country 
European  has  achieved  any  permanent  success.  Throughout  Europe^ 

analogies.  .  .  •~™™^»— — «^— — — 

notwithstanding  a  current  American  idea  to  the  contrary, 
national  and  municipal  party  lines  are  almost  everywhere 
identified,.  Nowhere  in  France  or  Germany  have  the  na- 
tional parties  been  definitively  ousted  from  city  politics. 
In  England  there  are  nominal  instances  of  strictly  municipal 
parties,  but  very  little  study  is  sufficient  to  show  that  they 
are  not  such  in  reality.  The  most  notable  example  is  af- 
forded by  London,  where  two  ostensibly  local  parties  known 
as  Progressives  and  Reformers  have  divided  the  allegiance 
of  the  voters  by  presenting  to  them  two  party  programmes 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND  POLITICS  159 

built  upon  local  issues.  But  every  Londoner  knows  that 
the  Progressive  party  is  made  up  mainly  of  Liberals  and  that 
most  of  the  Reformers  are  Conservatives.  There  is  of  course 
no  exact  coincidence  of  national  and  local  party  lines,  but 
there  is  a  fair  approximation  to  that  situation.1  The  char- 
acteristic  feature  of  London  politics  is  not  the  existence 
of  strictly  municipal  partiesT  but  rather  the  prominence 
given  in  local  elections  to  local  issues,  and  the  readiness  of. 
the  voter,  whatever  his  party  affiliations,  to  be  guided  by  a 
candidate's  qualifications  and  record  rather  than  by  his 
professions  and  promises. 

Apart  from  the  various  obstacles  that  stand  in  the  way  of  Difficulties 
regular  municipal  parties  as  steady  factors  in  city  affairs,  the  fn  New  " 
entire  divorce  of  state  and  local  party  organizations  is  for  York* 
another  reason  difficult  to  bring  about.     This  reason  lies 
in  the  frequent  similarity,  and  evpn  identity,  of  state  and 
municipal  issues.     Were  the  American  city  master  of  itsL. 
own  destinies,  this   identity   would  not   often   arisen   but 
under  the  present  system  of  unremitting  legislative  inter- 
ference in  municipal  matters,  problems  of  a  purely  local 
scope  are  too  often  settled,  not  at   the  city  hall,  but  at 
the  state  capitol.     This  means  that  even^ffihen._a^jrriiinicinaL 
party  gets  control  of  the  city  government  it  does  not  always 
get  a  mastery  of  the  city's  policy :    to  secure  the  latter  it 
must  often  enter  state  politics  and  try  to  make  its  influence, 
felt  in  the  legislature.     Some  years  ago  the  Citizens'  Union 
of  New  York  encountered  this   situation.     After   gaining 
control  of  the  city  government,  it  found  itself  balked  in  its 

1  "In  London  these  divisions  tend  to  run  close  to  the  national  party 
lines  ;  for  although  a  Liberal  is  not  always  a  Progressive,  or  a  Conservative 
always  a  Moderate  [Reformer],  and  a  member  of  one  national  party  may 
actually  stand  for  the  council  on  the  opposite  side,  still  the  two  lines  coin- 
cide on  the  whole  very  nearly,  and  the  party  organizations  lend  their  aid 
to  no  small  extent  in  the  contest."  —  A.  L.  LOWELL,  Government  of  Eng- 
land, II.  151.  See  also  Munro's  Government  of  European  Cities,  346-347. 


160 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


efforts  to  carry  out  its  programme  by  an  unsympathetic 
The  state  legislature  at  Albany.     It  was,   accordingly,   forced 

Union.  to  choose  between  remaining  an  ineffective  municipal  party 
and  becoming  a  factor  in  state  politics.  To  pursue  the 
former  course  was  to  court  certain  defeat  at  the  next  elec- 
tion; to  follow  the  latter  policy  was  to  give  up  the  chief 
principle  upon  which  the  Citizens'  Union  was  founded. 
The  experience  of  other  cities  has  in  many  cases  been  sim- 
ilar. City  and  state  functions  cannot  be  sharply  differenti- 
ated ;  neither  can  city  and  state  issues,  so  long  as  the  city 
is  the  creature  of  the  state.  From  the  nature  of  the  situa- 
tion a  certain  connection  between  state  and  municipal  party 
organizations  is  likely  to  continue,  whether  we  approve  of 
it  or  not.  If  independent  municipal  parties  could  be  es- 
tablished and  maintained  in  successful  existence,  some  city 
would  probably  have  given  us  a  good  example  before  now. 
American  municipal  experience  has  been  prolific  of  such 
parties,  but  none  have  lived  long  enough  to  prove  that  the 
natural  obstacles  are  surmountable. 

The  third  plan  for  diminishing  the  evils  which  commonly 
result  from  the  identification  of  state  and  municipal  parties 
the  ^o^8  in  ta^es  the  form  of  an  attempt  to  induce  the  chief  political 
grammes  of  parties  to  adopt  special  platforms,  or  parts  of  platforms, 
dealing  with  local  issues.  Such  endeavors  are  logical 
enough.  If  the  state  organization  feels  that  it  cannot  afford 
to  keep  clear  of  municipal  politics,  it  ought  in  fairness,  we 
are  told,  to  give  city  affairs  their  proper  share  of  atten- 
tion in  the  party  programme.  And  this  it  has  of  1at.fi  KP^T^ 
somewhat  inclined  to  do.  The  announcement  of  a  party's 
policy  on  important  local  matters  like  public-service  fran- 
chises, municipal  home  rule,  civil-service  reform,  license  regu- 
lations, and  so  forth,  is  coming  to  be  a  prominent  feature  of 
state  platforms  ;  and  it  is  likely  to  become  even  more  promi- 
nent as  time  goes  on  and  as  urban  problems  grow  to  be  of 


3.  incor- 
of  munici- 


parties. 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND  POLITICS  161 

greater  interest  to  the  whole  people.  It  has  been  suggested 
that  the  friends  of  better  city  government  should  spend  their 
energies,  not  in  a  futile  attempt  to  abolish  all  political 
parties,  or  in  efforts  to  drive  a  wedge  into  the  hierarchy  of 
party  organization,  but  in  an  earnest  endeavor  to  gain  for 
municipal  issues  a  proper  recognition  in  state  platforms.1 
Such  a  plan,  it  is  urged,  has  all  the  advantages  of  an  inde- 
pendent municipal-party  system,  with  none  of  its  great  diffi- 
culties. This  does  not  mean,  of  course,  that  independent 
organizations  should  not  be  encouraged  for  what  they  can  ac- 
complish. To  win  one  election  and  lose  the  next  may  be  a 
modest  achievement,  but  it  is  better  than  losing  both.  The 
Citizens'  Union  of  New  York  got  but  a  short  lease  of  power, 
but  for  even  that  the  city  has  some  cause  to  be  thankful. 
The  independent  municipal  party  can  at  least  put  the  regular 
parties  on  their  mettle,  and  force  them  to  a  realization  of  what 
the  community  wants  done.  After  all,  insurgency  is  more 
prolific  of  results  than  independence.  The  insurgents  within 
the  party  ranks  can  usually  accomplish  more  than  the 
bolters  who  leave  the  ranks  to  conduct  a  guerilla  warfare  of 
their  own. 

Taking  the  cities  of  the  United  States  as  they  are,  one  finds  The  exist- 
municipal  politics  to  be  featured  neither  by  an  absence  of  all  1 
parties  nor  by  the  prominence  of  strictly  local  party  organi- 
zations. Almost  everywhere  the  regular  party  lines  are 
drawn,  if  not  always  ostensibly,  at  any  rate  in  fact.  It 
becomes  of  importance,  therefore,  to  understand  how  the 
parties  organize  themselves  for  work  in  city  elections,  what 
their  methods  are,  and  to  what  extent  they  earn  their  right 
to  be  called  "  political  machines."  It  ought  to  be  mentioned, 
in  passing,  that  American  party  organization,  which  from 
the  viewpoint  of  efficiency  is  perhaps  the  best  in  the  world, 

1M.  R.  Maltbie,  "Municipal  Political  Parties,"  in  Proceedings  of  the 
National  Municipal  League,  1900,  p.  235. 


162  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

reaches  its  acme  in  the  large  city.  There  the  machine 
actually  approaches  perfection  both  in  the  clever  adjust- 
ment of  all  its  parts  and  in  the  smoothness  with  which 
it  proceeds  to  the  production  of  results.  The  physiology  of 
American  party  politics  can  be  best  studied  by  an  examina- 
tion of  its  most  highly  developed  organism,  the  political 
machine  of  a  large  city. 

Typical  The  framework  of  party  organization  is  not  everywhere 

ganiLtiona.  alike.  The  party  in  each  city  has  its  own  mechanism, 
which,  however,  differs  little  from  place  to  place,  especially 
in  general  methods.  In  New  York,  for  example,  th^  unit  of 
party  organization  is  the  assembly  district,  that  is  to  say, 
the  area  which  sends  a  representative  to  the  lower  branch 
of  the  state  legislature.  In  the  boroughs  of  Manhattan 
The  and  the  Bronx  there  are  thirty-five  of  these  districts.  In 

eac^  district  the  Democratic  voters  choose  delegates  to  a 
general  committee,  which,  since  there  is  one  delegate  for 
every  twenty-five  voters,  has  about  7000  members.1 
Being  too  large  to  do  any  executive  work  properly,  it  vests 
its  real  functions  in  an  executive  committee  of  thirty-five 
members, — each  usually  the  leader  of  an  assembly  district, — 
with  certain  ex-offi cio  members.  This  body  actually  controls 
the  policy  of  the  party.  It  is  at  once  the  regular  Democratic 
machine  and  the  political  organ  of  Tammany  Hall.  The 
latter  institution,  so  long  a  factor  in  New  York  politics  and 
now  dominant  on  the  Democratic  side  of  them,  has  a  history 
of  over  a  century.  Originally  a  social  and  charitable  society, 
it  soon  developed  political  interests,  and,  making  headway 
against  less  effective  party  groups,  in  time  obtained  its  pres- 
ent primacy  in  Democratic  circles.2 

1  This  general   committee  maintains  five  standing   committees,    on 
organization,   finance,    correspondence,   naturalization   of   alien    voters, 
and  printing,  respectively.     The  members  of  the  general  committee  from 
each  district  also  form  a  district  committee. 

2  Further   information   concerning   the   history   and   organization   of 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND   POLITICS  163 

It  has  been  observed  that  the  executive  committee  of  ita 
Tammany  is  made  up  of  the  thirty-five  district  leaders.  JSach  ^ 
leader,  besides  sharing  in  the  work  of  the  committee,  directs 
the  political  work  in  his  own  district  and  is  the  head  of  the 
district  organization.  For  the  more  effective  handling  of 
campaign  tasks  the  election  district  or  voting  precinct  is 
used  as  a  unit  of  local  organization.  It  is  one  of  the 
duties  of  the  district  leader  to  appoint  a  captain  for  every 
polling-precinct  in  the  district,  and  there  are  well  over 
1000  such  precincts  in  the  two  boroughs.  Eanh  napta,in 
has  a  small  corps  of  worker^,  and  is  held  strictly  accounta- 
ble for  getting  the  voters  registered  and  for  seeing  that  the 
vote  comes  out  on  election  day.  Such  is  the  framework 
of  official  organization.  Potentially  the  supreme  control  of 
the  party's  interests  rests  with  the  general  committee  of 
nearly  7000  delegates  chosen  by  the  voters.  In  practice 
thirty-five  assembly  district  leaders,  supported  by  the  host 
of  general  committeemen  in  each  district  and  the  hundreds 
of  precinct  captains  and  workers,  assume  the  real  direction 
of  the  election  campaigns. 

Supplementary  to  this  organization,  and  a  very  important.  The  regu- 

....  lar  clubs. 

influence  in  promoting  its  strength T  are  the  snores  of  os- 
tensibly social  bodies  which  form  centres  of  party  propa- 
ganda in  every  district  of  the  city.  These  associations 
commonly  rank  as  clubs,  and  each  has  its  own  distinctive 
name.  Each  has  its  regular  rendezvous,  usually  a  small 
hall  or  suite  of  two  or  three  rooms  in  a  central  location. 
Sometimes  there  is  also  a  room  for  billiards  and  other  games, 
and  in  some  cases  the  club  holds  a  license  to  serve 
liquors  to  its  own  members.  In  these  quarters  the  members 
gather  frequently  in  a  close  personal  intimacy,  and  attend 

Tammany  Hall  may  be  found  in  Dorman  B.  Eaton's  Government  of  Munici- 
palities (New  York,  1899),  chs.  iv.-vi.,  and  in  Gustavus  Myers'  History  of 
Tammany  Hall  (New  York,  1901). 


164 


GOVERNMENT    OF   AMERICAN   CITIES 


The  spo- 
radic clubs. 


The  Phila- 
delphia 
system. 


to  the  interests  of  the  party  in  the  immediate  neighborhood 
in  which  the  club  is  located.  A  spirit  of  partisan  loyalty 
is  thus  fostered  through  the  channels  of  everyday  friend- 
ship. When  necessary,  these  clubs  are  financed  from  above ; 
for  the  leaders  of  the  party  well  understand  their  value  in  an 
election  campaign. 

Along  with  these  more  or  less  permanent  associations 
are  the  sporadic  political  clubs  that  come  into  being  a  month 
or  so  before  the  election  and  disappear  as  soon  as  the  contest 
is  over.  These  likewise  are  social  in  outer  guise,  but  purely 
political  in  motiveT They  are  composed  of  groups  of  younger 
voters  who  are  for  the  most  part  already  personal  friends 
or  acquaintances,  but  who  find  in  the  approaching  election 
an  opportunity  to  enjoy,  for  the  time  being,  a  place  of 
rendezvous  with  occasional  distributions  of  liquors  and 
cigars  at  no  cost  to  themselves.  A  small  hall  is  procured, 
and  is  fitted  up  with  chairs  and  table ;  smoke-talks  by  minor 
fry  among  the  party  leaders  are  announced ;  stray  voters 
are  corralled  and  brought  into  nominal  membership ;  and 
the  necessary  neighborhood  enthusiasm  for  the  party  slate 
is  manufactured  by  an  occasional  parade  with  a  band  and  red 
fire.  To  some  extent  these  fly-by-night  clubs  may  ren- 
der political  service  equivalent  in  value  to  the  funds  which 
they  draw  from  the  party  treasury ;  but  on  the  whole  they 
are  not  regarded  as  very  profitable  adjuncts  to  the  party 
organization.  In  many  cases  they  are  little  more  than 
agencies  for  extracting,  either  from  candidates  or  from  the 
organization,  enough  money  to  keep  in  good  humor  a  lot 
of  political  rounders  whose  votes  would  be  had  anyway. 
New  York  is  not  unique  in  the  possession  of  these  groups ; 
they  abound  in  all  large  cities  at  election  time. 

In  Philadelphia  the  system  of  party  organization  is  not 
widely  different  from  that  in  New  York.  Here,  however,  the 
unit  of  organization  is  not  the  legislative  district,  but  the  ward. 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND   POLITICS  165 


There  are  forty-two  wards  in  Philadelphia,  but 
has  several  polling-precincts  or  election  districts,  amount- 
ing  to  nearly  1100  in  all.  On  the  first  Tuesday  of  April  in 
each  year  a  caucus,  or  primary,  of  the  Republican  voters  in 
each  precinct  is  called,  and  this  elects  a  president,  secretary, 
and  treasurer,  together  with  two  registration  officials.  This 
body  of  five  has  charge  of  the  local  interests  of  the  party  in 
the  matter  of  registering  voters.  Each  of  the  fortv-two 
wards  has  a  Republican  ward  committee  made  up  of  two 
delegates  from  each  precinct,  who  are  chosen  by  the  party 
voters  of  the  precinct  at  a  regular  primary  election.  The 
size  of  the  ward  committee  depends,  of  course,  on  the  number 
of  precincts  in  the  ward,  which  ranges  from  ten  to  fifty  ;  the. 
chairman  of  the  committee  is  the  ward  leader.  The  super- 
vising organ  of  this  whole  system  is  the  central  city  commit- 
tee of  eighty-four  members,  composed  of  two  from  each 
ward,  who  are  selected  by  the  ward  committees.  This  cen- 
tral body  has  practically  final  jurisdiction  in  all  matters 
affecting  partisan  regularity.  The  system  constitutes  a  real 
hierarchy,  therefore  ;  for  the  central  committee  has  juris- 
diction over  the  ward  committees,  and  the  latter  in  turn 
have  a  like  authority  over  the  precinct  organizations.  As 
the  ultimate  source  of  all  authority  rests  in  the  Republican 
voters  at  the  primary,  the  fiction,  if  not  the  actuality,  of 
popular  organization  is  thus  scrupulously  preserved. 

In  Boston  the  nart.v  organization  "alan  talcfta  thft  ward    as  The  Boston 
the  unit.     Once  a  year  each  of  the  twenty-six  wards  of  the  Bys 
city    elects   its  respective  ward    committees,  the    enrolled 
members  of  each  party  receiving  ballots  upon  which  are 
printed  the  names  of  candidates  for  election  to  the  party 
committee.    jSach  ward  committee,  which  contains  one  mem- 
ber for  every  200  party  voters,  elects  its  chairman,  and  each  is 
upon  a  f>ity  committee  made  up  of  a  delegate 


(usually  the  chairman)  from  each  of  the  various  wajd 


166 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Variety 
and  unity 
in  party 
organiza- 
tion. 


mittees.  The  city  committee,  in  turn,  chooses  its  chairman 
and  secretary,  both  of  whom  give  nearly  their  whole  time 
to  the  party  service  during  the  period  of  an  election  cam- 
paign. In  both  parties,  however,  the  efficiency  and  disci- 
pline of  the  organization  has  been  greatly  weakened  by  the 
charter  amendments  of  1909,  which  substituted  nomination 
by  petition  for  nomination  by  party  primaries  in  the  case 
of  all  elective  city  officials,  took  party  designations  off  the 
ballots,  greatly  reduced  the  number  of  elective  posts,  and 
laid  many  effective  restrictions  upon  the  distribution  of  mu- 
nicipal patronage. 

Going  through  the  whole  list  of  larger  American  cities, 
one  would  find  that  party  organizations,  so  far  as  their 
relation  to  municipal  politics  is  concerned,  display  almost 
everywhere  the  same  characteristics.1  Each  organization 
takes  the  form  of  a  pyramid,  with  the  rank  and  file  of  par^ 
tisan  voters  forming  the  base.  These  delegate  their  powers 
to  a  large  group  of  ward  committeemen,  and  these  in  turn 
depute  their  authority  to  a  smaller  group  of  men  who  form 
an  executive  committee.  This  latter  committee  is  ostensibly 
a  responsible  body,  but  in  reality  it  is  not  so.  It  assumes  the 
plenary  powers  of  a  body  which  is  directing  the  tactics  of  a 
battle:  during  the  heat  of  an  election  campaign  there  is 
no  time  to  question  whether  the  party  leaders  are  ex- 
ceeding the  letter  of  their  powers.  Too  much  actual  democ- 
racy in  party  organization  does  not  make  for  machine-like 
precision;  accordingly,  much  that  has  the  externals  of 
popular  rule  is  in  effect  pure  autocracy.  If  the  party 
voters  would  come  out  to  the  caucuses  and  primaries  in  full 
strength,  the  situation  might  be  different ;  but  for  the  most 
part,  and  under  normal  conditions,  these  gatherings  are 
more  freely  patronized  by  hide-bound  partisans  than  by 


1  See  Jesse  Macy,  Party  Organization  and  Machinery  (New  York,  1904), 
especially  ch.  xvi. 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND   POLITICS  167 

voters  of  independent  tendencies.  The  substitution  of  the 
primary  for  the  caucus  has  not  changed  the  caliber  or  the 
methods  of  ward  or  city  committees ;  it  has  merely  given 
to  the  old  order  that  added  prestige  which  legal  recognition 
of  its  status  implies. 

The  work  which  the  party  organizations  lay  out  to  do.  Work  of 
and  in  large  measure  actually  perform,  is  extensive  and 
exacting.  It  does  not,  as  in  Europe,  all  fall  within  the  few 
weeks  which  precede  an  election ;  it  is  spread  over  the  whole 
year.  In  the  first  place,  there  is  the  task  of  getting  aliens 
naturalized,  so  that  their  names  may  ultimately  appear 
on  the  voters'  lists.  A  precinct  committee  which  does  its 
work  well  will  keep  careful  record  of  every  one  who  comes 
into  its  neighborhood,  and  will  proffer  its  help  freely  to  those 
who  seek  to  qualify  as  voters.  It  will  make  sure  that  all 
who  are  likely  to  vote  right  are  duly  registered;  and  on 
polling-day  it  will  see  that  checkers,  watchers,  conveyances, 
and  other  accessories  are  provided.  The  work  of  the  ward 
committee  is  of  somewhat  broader  scope.  Its  functions 
include  the  supervision  of  ward  headquarters,  its  chairman 
is  the  disburser  of  all  that  can  be  had  from  the  city  in  the 
way  of  patronage.1  Furthermore,  an  efficient  ward  organiza- 
tion manages  to  keep  its  solicitude  for  the  voters  constantly 
before  their  eyes.  When  there  is  a  public  building,  play- 
ground, or  anything  of  the  sort  to  be  located  somewhere, 
the  ward  chairman  will  urge  the  claims  of  his  own  locality ; 
when  there  are  appointments  to  be  made,  he  will  press 
for  a  share  on  behalf  of  candidates  from  his  own  ward ; 
if  there  are  any  favors,  official  or  unofficial,  to  be  distrib- 

1  The  disbursing  of  patronage,  in  general,  is  handled  about  as  follows  : 
llxe  ward  leader  (or  chairman)  keeps  for  himself  and  his  personal  friends 
all  that  he  dares.  A  part  of  what  is  left  goes  to  members  of  the  ward 
committee.  The  rest  is  distributed  outside  this  immediate  circle  wher- 
ever it  seems  likely  to  promote  the  ward  leader's  strength  or  allay  oppo- 
sition to  him. 


168 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


The  city 
committee. 


uted,  the  ward  chairman  will  see  that  they  go  where  they 
will  do  the  most  good.  During  the  election  campaign  the 
committee  provides  for  minor  rallies  within  the  ward,  and 
attends  to  many  local  details  turned  over  to  it  by  the  central 
city  committee. 

The  city  committee,  on  its  part,  is  the  general  board  of 
strategy.  But  its  actual  functions  in  this  regard  are  usu- 
ally arrogated  by  a  small  clique  of  leaders  and  personal 
friends  of  the  chief  party  candidate,  not  all  of  whom  may 
be  members  of  the  committee.  This  small  group,  with  the 
assistance  of  the  whole  committee,  directs  the  general  party 
policy,  selecting  so  far  as  it  can  the  issues  that  are  to  be 
emphasized  and  usually  handling  the  literature  of  the  cam- 
paign; it  provides  the  press  service,  supplying  the  news- 
papers with  facilities  and  copy ;  it  arranges  for  the  speakers 
at  the  various  rallies;  and  it  superintends  the  collection 
and  distribution  of  the  campaign  funds.  Above  all,  it  has 
direct  supervision  of  the  central  headquarters,  an  office  that 
becomes  the  pivotal  point  in  the  party's  activities.  A  great 
deal,  therefore,  depends  upon  the  men  who  make  up  this 
group,  and  particularly  upon  the  man  who  is  at  the  head 
of  it.  The  routine  of  a  municipal  campaign  is  much  the 
same  everywhere;  but  the  effectiveness  of  this  routine 
work  hinges  upon  the  popularity  of  the  issues  selected  for 
emphasis,  and  upon  the  energy  that  can  be  inspired  from 
headquarters. 

The  More  can  be  accomplished  in  American  cities  by  persistent 

premium* on  political  industry  than  in  any  other  cities  of  the  world.  In 
England,  although  organization  and  vigorous  effort  on  the 
eve  of  an  election  count  for  much,  the  fact  remains  that 
public  sentiment  reacts  against  the  candidate  who  seems 
to  make  politics  his  profession.  Too  much  work  in  his 
behalf  is  apt  to  alienate  voters.  In  America  there  seems  to 
be  no  such  danger.  The  more  enthusiasm  and  effort  that  a 


party 
activity. 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND   POLITICS  169 

candidate  and  his  frieyids  put,  into  fl,  campaign  the  better  the 
voters  seem  to  like  it  :  hence  it  is  thought  well  to  begin  early, 
to  press  the  party's  claims  upon  the  attention  of  the  voters 
without  a  moment's  let-up,  and  to  demonstrate  how  much 
energy  is  in  reserve  by  a  whirlwind  finish  on  the  eve  of  the 
election.  To  do  all  this  requires  the  full  time  of  many 
persons  while  a  campaign  is  in  progress  ;  and  when  elections 
come  annually  such  persons  never  have  much  opportunity  for 
anything  but  political  work.  That  is  why  the  professional 
politician  finds  a  place  in  American  municipal  life.  To 
desire  the  end  is  usually  to  tolerate  the  means.  So  long  asi 
public  opinion  relishes  the  expenditure  of  so  much  time  and 
energy  during  the  months  preceding  a  municipal  election, 
and  so  long  as  annual  elections  continue  to  be  the  rule,  it 
is  not  to  be  expected  that  politics  will  cease  to  be  a 
recognized  vocation. 

For  the  proper  performance  of  all  this  work  the  party  Party 
organization  needs  a  good  deal  of  money.  An  important 
office,  therefore,  is  that  of  treasurer  of  the  citv  commit- 
tee. This  post  is  usually  given  to  some  man  who  has 
financial  standing  in  the  community,  and  who,,  because  of 
his  business  connections  or  for  other  reasons,  is  able  to  get, 
easily  into  touch  with  the  elements  that  are  likely  to  be  the 
most  generous  contributors  to  the  party  exchequer  ._  From 
the  treasurer's  office  circulars  soliciting  contributions  are 
sent  out  to  all  those  who  have  helped  in  previous  campaigns, 
and  to  such  others  as  seem  likely  to  prove  responsive.  This 
appeal  is  followed  up  by  personal  solicitations  either  on  the 
part  of  the  treasurer  himself  or  by  the  committeemen  who 
assist  him,  the  scope  of  the  canvass  depending  upon  the 
urgency  of  the  need.  Funds  come  in  from  various  sources.  The 
The  candidate  himself  is  expected  to  contribute  substan- 


tially  ;  in  fact,  the  amount  of  his  subscription  is  sometimes  cpntrib«- 

....      tiona. 

fixed  by  a  general  understanding  when  his  nomination   is 


170  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

arranged  for.  Members  of  the  party  who  are  already  in 
municipal  office,  or  who  hold  paid  administrative  posts, 
are  also  expected  to  respond  generously;  and  they  usually 
do  so.  The  current  notion  among  politicians  is  that  the 
man  in  office  should  prove  his  gratitude  to  those  who  put 
him  there  by  contributing  liberally  from  his  public  salary  to 
the  party  income.  Then  there  are  the  public-service  cor- 
porations, which,  even  when  prohibited  by  law  or  confronted 
by  legal  requirements  in  regard  to  the  publication  of  cam- 
paign contributions,  almost  always  donate  freely,  and 
usually  without  favor,  to  the  funds  of  both  parties  when- 
ever the  strength  of  the  two  parties  is  sufficiently  well- 
balanced  to  render  the  issue  of  an  election  at  all  in  doubt. 
Since  they  desire  privileges  from  the  city  government,  they 
feel  that  they  cannot  afford  to  antagonize  both  parties  by  re- 
fusing to  contribute  at  all ;  nor  are  they  willing  to  take  the 
chance  of  having  supported  the  losing  side,  as  might  be  the 
case  if  they  contributed  to  the  funds  of  one  party  only. 
But  when  there  is  a  great  difference  in  strength  between 
the  two  parties,  the  stronger  gets  the  whole  contribution 
and  the  weaker  obtains  nothing  at  all.  Since  in  any  case 
all  such  disbursements  come  ultimately  from  the  public, 
however,  and  not  from  the  corporate  stockholders,  the  policy 
of  forbidding  all  such  contributions  has  been  growing  in 
favor  during  recent  years,  although  as  yet  these  prohibitions 
have  not  proved  proof  against  evasion.  Other  persons 
likely  to  be  approached  by  the  party  treasurer  are  munici- 
pal contractors,  aspirants  to  appointive  offices,  holders  of 
licenses,  —  all  of  those,  indeed,  who  have  occasion  to  deal 
with  the  city  government  in  any  capacity.  All  such  are 
apt  to  feel  that  by  contributing  they  will  strengthen 
their  own  positions.  Finally,  there  are  always  many  sub- 
scribers actuated  by  unselfish  motives,  who,  desiring  only 
the  success  of  that  party  in  whose  programme  they  be- 


\ 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND   POLITICS  171 

lieve,  contribute  as  to  a  public  cause.  The  motives  of  men 
are  not  often  easy  to  fathom,  and  when  they  can  be  dis- 
covered they  are  rarely  found  to  be  simple.  A  variety  of 
factors  usually  combine  to  make  one  individual  contribute 
and  another  refrain.  But  no  one  can  scan  the  published 
lists  of  contributors  without  being  impressed  with  a  feeling 
that  the  sinews  of  party  conflict  are  furnished,  in  the  main, 
by  those  who  are  fairly  close  to  the  organization  rather  than 
by  those  who  are  not  even  indirectly  connected  with  it. 
Much  of  the  money  that  comes  in  is  given  quite  voluntarily ; 
more  of  it,  perhaps,  flows  in  under  varying  degrees  of  pressure, 
open  or  implied ;  but  some  of  it  is  not  infrequently  the 
fruit  of  pure  blackmail,  levied  upon  office-holders  and  others 
who  dare  not  refuse  the  party's  demands. 

Most  of  the  money  which  the  party  treasurer  can  bring  where  the 
together  is  needed  for  purely  legitimate  routine  expenses,  Iloney  goea> 
such  as  the  rental  of  city  and  ward  headquarters  and  of 
halls  for  rallies,  the  cost  of  advertising,  printing,  bill-posting, 
and  postage,  the  wages  of  clerks  and  stenographers,  pay- 
ments for  checkers,  watchers,  and  other  workers  on  polling- 
day,  the  hire  of  conveyances  to  bring  voters  to  the  polls, 
and  little  appropriations  for  bands,  transparencies,  and  the 
other  accessories  of  party  display.  In  any  large  city  these 
items  combine  to  foot  up  a  considerable  sum.  Some  of  the 
party's  income  may  be  and  probably  is  spent  for  sinister 
purposes,  but  not  directly  from  headquarters.  It  is  cus-: 
tomary,  a  few  days  before  the  election,  to  give  to  each 
ward  or  district  leader  a  certain  sum  fa)  be  used  by  him, 
and  his  committee  within  their  own  Jurisdiction.  Much  of 
this  goes  to  employ  men  who  are  listed  in  the  subsequent 
return  of  expenditures  as  "messengers,"  but  who  in  reality 
are  voters  to  whom  small  sums  (usually  five  dollars  each) 
are  paid  for  work  in  the  party's  interest  on  the  day  of  the 
election.  The  only  service  these  "messengers"  perform  is 


172  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

that  of  voting  right  themselves  and  perhaps  influencing  a 
few  friends  in  the  same  direction.  The  practice  has  the 
externals  of  legitimacy,  but  much  of  the  money  spent  in 
this  way  is  sheer  bribery.  To  put  the  whole  matter  in 
another  way,  one  might  say  that,  while  comparatively  little 
of  the  party's  income  now  goes  for  purposes  that  are  clearly 
illegitimate,  a  considerable  part  of  it,  though  disbursed  for 
things  which  are  ostensibly  within  the  law  (such  as  rentals, 
advertising,  services,  etc.),  is  invariably  spent  in  ways  that 
constitute  a  virtual  purchase  of  votes.  It  is  to  keep  such 
payments  within  proper  bounds  that  the  stringent  laws 
relating  to  election  expenditures,  mentioned  in  the  preceding 
chapter,  have  been  pressed  to  enactment. 

The  dia-  But  it  is  not  through  the  possession  of  ample  funds  that 

patronage?  ward  and  district  organizations  and  leaders  get  their  strength  ; 
for  the  funds  at  their  command  are  not  ample.  Contrary 
to  the  popular  impression,  the  ward  leader  has  throughout 
the  greater  part  of  the  year  very  little  money  on  which  to 
keep  his  organization  alive.  He  has  other  resources,  however, 
which  serve  his  ends  as  well  or  even  better.  Chief  among 
these  is  his  wide  range  of  patronage,  official  and  unofficial. 
In  the  days  before  civil-service  reform  laws  began  to  protect 
the  city's  pay-roll  from  his  talons,  the  ward  boss  rewarded 
party  service  and  loyalty  by  gaining  positions  in  the  various 
municipal  departments  for  the  more  valiant  of  his  supporters. 
By  the  development  of  the  merit  system,  however,  this  field  of 
official  exploitation  has  been  steadily  reduced,  until  in  many 
cities  it  no  longer  affords  the  ward  organizations  their 
livelihood.  Recourse  has  accordingly  been  had  to  unofficial 
patronage ;  that  is,  to  the  securing  of  jobs  or  favors  for  party 
henchmen  from  public-service  corporations,  municipal  con- 
tractors, firms  that  sell  supplies  to  the  city.  —  from  alL 
indeed,  who  have  anything  to  gain  from  the  ward  leader's 
support  or  anything  to  lose  by  his  opposition.  Street- 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND  POLITICS  173 

railway  companies,  gas  and  electric  companies,  contractors 
for  street  pavements,  and  so  on,  all  bear  on  their  pay-rolls 
men  whose  services  to  them  are  largely  political;  and  the 
same  thing  is  sometimes  done  by  banks  and  other  financial 
institutions  that  carry  the  city's  accounts  or  do  the  business 
of  those  public-service  corporations  which  serve  the  city.1 
Ward  leaders  have  asked  that  these  men  be  employed,  and 
in  the  long  run  it  is  cheaper  to  comply  with  such  requests  — 
so  long  as  a  leader  does  not  ask  too  much  —  than  to  fight  him 
in  the  city  council  or  the  legislature,  in  each  of  which  he  is 
likely  to  have  one  or  more  minions.  The  real  snnrnft  of  the 
ward  leader's  strength  lies  in  his  ability  to  do  substantial 
favors  for  his  adherents,  as  well  as  in  the  number  of  reputedly 
honest  m'tisfma  on,  whom  he  may  depend  to  carry  out  his 
wishes. 

Unofficial  patronage  thus  runs  a  vicious  circle.  The  The  vice 
ward  organization  thrives  on  the  supineness  of  those  cor- 
porations  and  individuals  who  seek  public  favors;  the 
latter,  in  turn,  get  or  hope  to  get  what  they  are  after  by 
purchasing  political  support  in  this  way.  By  using  money 
the  corporations  get  men,  and  by  using  men  they  get  money. 
Hence  it  has  come  to  pass  that  taking  municipal  offices 
and  contracts  out  of  politics  has  not  appreciably  increased 
the  politician's  difficulty  in  maintaining  an  effective  organi- 
zation. For  it  is  not  alone  the  office-holder  and  the  con- 
tractor who  seek  to  benefit  by  the  favor  of  the  community. 
The  host  of  public  utilities,  so  long  as  they  find  it  profitable 
to  supply  the  ward  leaders  with  a  substitute  for  those  official 
spoils  which  the  laws  have  removed  from  their  grasp,  can 
hardly  be  otherwise  than  important  factors  in  keeping 

1  The  extent  to  which  these  things  are  done,  and  the  very  fact  of  their 
existence  on  a  considerable  scale,  are  hard  to  prove ;  but  a  careful  and 
thorough  examination  of  the  facts  will  convince  any  one  who  can  gain 
access  to  the  inner  circles  of  party  management  that  these  statements  are 
substantially  true  in  every  large  city  of  the  United  States. 


174  GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN   CITIES 

the  machine  supplied  with  motive  power.  There  is  scarcely 
a  large  city  in  the  United  States  which  has  not,  within  very 
recent  years,  felt  the  demoralizing  influence  of  political 
hirelings  who  owe  their  power  to  the  pelf  and  patronage 
furnished  at  their  behest  by  public-service  corporations  and 
other  seekers  of  privilege.1  The  system  is  one  which  creates 
no  such  popular  protest  as  did  the  old  practice  of  nourishing 
the  party  organization  by  the  distribution  of  city  offices  and 
contracts  among  the  party  stalwarts.  For  that  very  reason 
it  is  more  insidious  in  its  operation  and  more  dangerous  in  its 
influence.  Under  the  old  spoils  system  political  debts  were 
contracted  and  discharged  in  full  view  of  the  electorate.  Thg. 
new  circle  of  demoralization  runs  its  round  without  disclosing 
itself,  save  by  a  slight  flash  here  and  there,  to  anv  but  those 
immediately  concerned. 

The  boss ;  Much  of  the  blame  for  wastefulness  and  chicanery  in  the 
conduct  of  the  city's  business  has  been  laid  upon  the  party 
boss  and  upon  the  machine  of  which  he  operates  the  throttle ; 
and  most  of  it  has  doubtless  been  entirely  deserved.  But  the 
denunciators  of  municipal  bossism  usually  overlook  the  real 
source  of  trouble,  which  is  not  the  iniquitous  ideals  and  meth- 
ods of  the  boss  himself,  but  that  supine  element  in  the  comr 
munity  which,  while  professing  abhorrence  for  him,  yet  fur- 
nishes most  of  his  resources.  The  ward  boss  has  rarely  any 
very  attractive  personal  traits.  Usually  of  low  birth,  little 
education,  dubious  habits,  and  more  or  less  slovenly  appear- 
ance, he  is  a  fair  target ;  and  the  weapons  of  regeneration  have 
more  often  been  directed  at  him  than  at  the  conditions  which 

1"The  privilege-seeker  has  pervaded  our  political  life.  For  lus  own 
profit  he  has  wilfully  befouled  the  sources  of  political  power.  Politics, 
which  should  offer  a  career  inspiring  to  the  noblest  thoughts  and  calling 
for  the  most  patriotic  efforts  of  which  man  is  capable,  he  has,  so  far  as  he 
could,  transformed  into  a  series  of  sordid  transactions  between  those  who 
buy  and  those  who  sell  governmental  action." — H.  E.  DEMENQ,  Government 
of  American  Cities  (New  York,  1909),  194. 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND   POLITICS  175 

clothe  such  an  individual  with  power.1  It  seems  usually  to  be 
forgotten  that  the  evolution  of  the  boss  follows  the  law  of 
natural  selection,  which  in  this  case  secures  the  survival  of  the 
man  who  is  most  resourceful  in  using  to  full  advantage  the 
conditions  that  he  finds  about  him.  To  gain  even  a  ward 
leadership  and  to  hold  this  post  requires  industry,  persever- 
ance, and  no  end  of  shrewd  tactfulness.  A  successful  ward, 
boss  must  be  a  worker,  capable  by  his  example  of  inspiring 
others  to  similar  industry,  lie  must  not  be  content  with 
doing  the  work  that  comes  to  him ;  he  must  look  for  things 
to  do.  As  his  work  consists  mainly  in  doing  favors  for 
voters,  he  must  inspire  requests  as  well  as  grant  them. 
Therefore  he  encourages  voters  to  come  to  him  for  help  when 
they  are  out  of  work  or  in  any  other  sort  of  trouble.  When  a 
voter  is  arrested,  the  ward  or  district  leader  will  lend  his 
services  to  secure  bail  or  to  provide  counsel,  or  will  arrange 
to  have  the  offender's  fine  paid  for  him.  Then  there  are  the 
day-to-day  favors  which  the  local  boss  stands  ready  to  do 
for  all  who  come  to  him,  provided  they  are  voters  or  can 
influence  voters.  These  services  cannot  be  even  recapitu- 
lated here,  for  their  name  is  legion.  To  one  he  lends  money 
to  stall  a  landlord  whose  patience  is  exhausted ;  to  the  family 
of  another  he  sends  fuel  or  provisions  in  time  of  need.  "He 
buys  medicine  for  the  sick  and  helps  to  bury  the  dead.  He 
dispenses  an  ample  hospitality  in  the  saloons ;  as  soon  as  he 
comes  in,  friends  known  and  unknown  gather  about  him,  and 
he  treats  everybody.  He  is  the  only  one  who  does  not 
drink,  for  he  is  on  duty." 2  Tested  by  his  acts,  the  boss  is 

1  Two  notable  exceptions,  both  of  them  discriminating  discussions  of 
the  real  sources  from  which  the  boss  derives  his  power,  are  the  article  on 
"The  American  Boss"  by  the  late  Justice  Francis  Cabot  Lowell  in  the 
Atlantic  Monthly,  LXXXVI.  289  (September,  1900),  and  the  chapter  on 
"The  Boss"  in  Professor  F.  J.  Goodnow's  Politics  and  Administration 
(New  York,  1900). 

2  M.  Ostrogorski,  Democracy  and  the  Party  System  (New  York,  1910), 
237-238. 


176  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

chief  among  neighborhood  philanthropists;  judged  by  the 
motives  that  prompt  his  acts,  he  is  a  serpent  spreading 
the  slime  of  political  debauchery  over  whole  sections  of  the 
community.  With  the  submerged  tenth  (it  would  be  more 
accurately  termed  the  submerged  half)  of  a  great  city's 
population,  however,  it  is  the  acts  and  not  the  motives  of 
men  that  weigh. 

But  it  is  not  alone  as  a  purveyor  of  favors  and  petty  pre- 
ferment that  the  ward  leader  holds  his  sway.  He  is  also  a  dis- 
penser of  equally  petty  penalties  and  annoyances  among  those 
who  fail  to  truckle  to  his  will.  The  way  in  which  he  holds 
the  whip-hand  over  the  keepers  of  saloons  and  other  places, 
of  public  resort  is  too  well  known  to  need  more  than  passing 
mention.  But  his  power  does  not  stop  there..  If  a  word 
from  the  boss  will  get  one  man  employment,  a  word  will  also, 
very  often,  procure  another  employee's  dismissal.  At  a  hint 
from  him  the  small  shopkeeper,  thepedler,  the  pawnbroker,  the 
hackman,  can  be  worried  daily  by  the  police  or  by  the  health 
and  sanitary  officials  of  the  city  on  baseless  or  imaginary 
pretexts, — tactics  in  which,  as  the  history  of  almost  every 
large  city  shows,  the  machine  is  unrelenting  and  vindictive. 
In  the  higher  walks  of  industry  and  trade  the  same  policy 
is  pursued  through  somewhat  different  channels.  There 
the  assessors  or  the  building  inspectors  or  some  others 
among  the  city's  hierarchy  of  officials  are  egged  on  against 
the  unfriendly.  The  merchant  first  learns  that  he  has 
offended  a  political  leader  when  his  assessment  for  personal 
property  is  raised  to  the  legal  maximum,  or  when  he  is 
ordered  to  provide  additional  fire  appliances  in  accordance 
with  the  provisions  of  some  half-forgotten  law,  or  when  the 
drivers  of  carriages  and  delivery  wagons  before  his  door  are 
annoyed  by  the  police  in  their  enforcement  of  the  city 
ordinances.  The  manufacturer,  again,  is  liable  to  reap  the 
whirlwind  of  his  recalcitrancy  in  petty  persecutions  for  the 


MUNICIPAL   PARTIES  AND   POLITICS  177 

technical  violation  of  laws  relating  to  the  employment  of 
minors,  or  to  overtime  labor,  or  the  like.  The  public-service 
corporation  finds  itself  penalized  by  "strike"  ordinances, 
or  measures  that  are  framed  to  give  the  company  trouble 
and  worry.  So  expensive  is  the  task  of  fighting  a  hostile 
and  vindictive  political  machine  that  there  arises  a  strong 
temptation  to  make  a  truce  with  it.  But  in  the  long  run, 
a  policy  of  yielding  to  such  pressure  is  bound  to  prove 
more  expensive  still.  If  the  business  community  could  be 
brought  to  realize  that  peace  with  political  buccaneers  at 
their  own  price  is  not  only  bad  politics  but  bad  business, 
this  whole  system  of  virtual  blackmail  would  soon  pass 
out  of  existence. 

Wherever  one  may  turn,  therefore,  the  hand  of  the  politi- 
cal  boss  is  in  evidence.  It  is  unceasingly  put  forth  to  help  patronage 
some  and  to  hinder  others,  acting  always  on  the  principle, 
however,  that  he  who  is  not  for  the  machine  is  against  it. 
But  whether  to  help  or  to  hurt,  its  source  of  potency  is  al- 
ways the  same,  —  namely,  the  patronage  which  it  can  either 
provide  or  withhold.  This  patronage,  the  ramifications 
of  which  can  hardly  ever  be  traced  to  their  end,  is  at  once 
the  source  of  a  ward  leader's  power  and  the  weapon  with 
which  he  crushes  opposition.  Power  and  patronage  pro- 
vide a  cycle  hard  to  break.  Each  keeps  the  other  intact. 
The  removal  of  official  patronage  in  the  form  of  appoint- 
ments, contracts,  and  so  forth  from  the  arena  of  politics  has 
been  an  achievement  of  much  value ;  but  it  must  always  be 
remembered  that  the  most  lucrative  spoils  are  not  official. 
They  come  ultimately  from  the  pockets  of  the  public,  it  is 
true,  but  not  as  spoils  of  partisan  conflict.  They  are  the 
privileges  which  citizens  and  corporations  may  rightly  claim 
from  the  city,  but  for  which  they  must  pay  toll  to  politi- 
cians if  they  desire  to  avoid  endless  trouble  in  obtaining 
them.  With  this  triad  of  city  politics,  parties,  and  patron- 


178  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

age  so  closely  linked  together,  reform  has  found  some  dif- 
ficulty in  choosing  its  point  of  most  effective  attack.  That 
the  most  vulnerable  spot,  however,  lies  not  so  much  in  the 
machinery  of  municipal  government  or  in  the  organization 
of  parties  as  in  the  existing  system  of  patronage,  there  can, 
from  recent  experience,  be  very  little  doubt.  The  simpli- 
fication of  municipal  machinery  by  the  reduction  of  elective 
officers  and  the  centralizing  of  responsibility  has  accom- 
plished much,  and  may  do  still  more,  in  the  way  of  curbing 
the  politician's  power  for  harm;  and  there  are  capabilities 
of  like  service  in  the  establishment  of  independent  munici- 
pal parties,  even  though  they  be  short-lived,  and  the  push- 
ing of  municipal  questions  to  prominence  in  the  programmes 
of  state  parties.  But  most  encouraging  of  all  present-day 
municipal  phenomena  is  the  steadily  rising  tide  of  public 
opinion  that  has  set  against  the  system  of  business  black- 
mail which  now  provides  the  professional  politician  with 
his  sinews  of  war.  The  public-service  corporations,  which 
have  been  thus  exploited  in  largest  measure,  are  already 
feeling  the  force  of  popular  antagonism  in  laws  that  penalize 
even  to  a  vindictive  degree  their  slightest  participation  in 
politics.  Big  business  is  the  first  to  be  called  to  account 
for  its  sins  only  because  it  has  been  the  chief  offender ;  little 
business  will  doubtless  have  its  turn  in  due  course.  The 
elimination  of  politics  from  the  official  business  of  the  city 
is  only  one  step  in  the  direction  of  civic  regeneration ;  the, 
ousting  of  politics  from  private  business  is  a  task  of  even 
greater  importance^ 

REFERENCES 

The  best  general  work  on  the  history,  organization,  and  activities  of 
parties  in  the  United  States  is  M.  Ostrogorski's  Democracy  and  the  Organi- 
zation of  Political  Parties  (2  vols.,  New  York,  1902).  These  volumes  con- 
tain a  comprehensive,  accurate,  and  interesting  survey  of  the  entire  sub- 
ject. An  abridged  edition,  in  a  single  volume,  was  issued  recently  under 
the  title  Democracy  and  the  Party  System  in  the  United  States  (New  York, 


MUNICIPAL  PARTIES  AND   POLITICS  179 

1910).  Other  useful  and  readable  works  are  Jesse  Macy's  Party  Organi- 
zation and  Machinery  (New  York,  1912),  and  J.  A.  Woodburn'a  Political 
Parties  and  Party  Problems  (New  York,  1906).  Excellent  short  discus- 
sions are  in  H.  J.  Ford's  Rise  and  Growth  of  American  Politics  (New  York, 
1898),  especially  chs.  vii.,  xxiii.-xxv.,  and  F.  J.  Goodnow's  Politics  and 
Administration  (New  York,  1900),  especially  chs.  iii.,  viii.-ix. 

On  the  detailed  organization  of  the  party  forces  in  individual  cities  very 
little  has  been  printed,  except  in  the  handbooks  issued  by  the  organiza- 
tions for  the  use  of  their  own  officers  and  members,  —  as,  for  example,  the 
Rules  and  Regulations  of  the  Democratic- Republican  Organization  of  the 
County  of  New  York  (New  York,  1908).  It  need  scarcely  be  said,  however, 
that  the  actual  facts  of  organization  do  not  hew  closely  to  the  rules  laid 
down  in  such  manuals.  The  evolution  of  the  New  York  municipal  democ- 
racy may  be  studied  in  Gustavus  Myers's  History  of  Tammany  Hall  (New 
York,  1901) ;  and  some  idea  of  the  situation  in  the  metropolis  during  the 
halcyon  days  of  the  machine's  supremacy  may  be  gleaned  from  W.  M. 
Ivins's  Machine  Politics  (New  York,  1887)  and  Theodore  Roosevelt's 
Essays  on  Practical  Politics  (New  York,  1888).  Machine  methods  in 
other  cities  are  described,  without  any  undue  leniency,  in  such  works  aa 
John  Wanamaker's  Speeches  on  Quayism  and  Boss  Domination  in  Phila- 
delphia Politics  (Philadelphia,  1898),  John  Jay  Chapman's  Causes  and 
Consequences  (New  York,  1898),  F.  C.  Howe's  The  City,  the  Hope  of 
Democracy  (New  York,  1905),  and  Lincoln  Steffens's  Struggle  for  Self- 
government  (New  York,  1906),  as  well  as  in  numerous  articles  printed  in 
the  annual  Proceedings  of  such  organizations  as  the  National  Municipal 
League  and  the  National  Civil  Service  Reform  Association.  The  Reports 
of  the  Boston  Finance  Commission  (7  vols.,  Boston,  1908-1912)  contain 
many  examples  illustrating  the  results  of  machine  domination  in  city 
government. 

The  devious  ways  of  the  municipal  politician  cannot,  however,  be  mas- 
tered by  any  study  of  printed  materials.  His  motives,  methods,  resources, 
and  his  facility  in  achieving  results  can  be  fully  understood  only  by  one 
who  is  ready  to  gain  such  knowledge  by  the  personal  sacrifice  involved 
in  taking  a  place  on  the  firing  line  in  one  or  more  municipal  campaigns. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE  CITY  COUNCIL 

History  of  THERE  was  a  time  in  American  municipal  history  when 
council  the  council  was  the  chief,  and  in  fact  the  only,  governing 
organ  of  the  city.  It  has  long  since  ceased  to  be  the  sole 
organ  of  civic  administration,  and  in  some  places  it  is  no 
longer  the  dominant  one ;  but  it  retains  everywhere  some 
of  its  old-time  importance,  and  in  some  places  it  has  still 
to  be  reckoned  with  in  every  municipal  undertaking. 

The  importance  of  the  council  as  an  organ  of  local  gov- 
ernment during  the  earlier  stages  of  American  municipal 
development  arose  from  the  fact  that  the  first  English  cities 
of  the  New  World  adopted  the  system  of  urban  administra- 
tion then  existing  in  the  motherland.  Although  in  England 
the  gradual  narrowing  of  the  circle  of  freemen  had  deprived 
city  government  of  its  earlier  democratic  character,  the 
theory  of  popular  local  control  was  at  least  maintained,  and 
a  council  elected  by  the  burghers  of  the  city  managed  all 
important  municipal  affairs.  At  the  time  of  its  transplanta- 
tion to  the  American  colonies,  the  English  municipal  sys- 
tem was  a  democracy  in  principle,  but  a  sheer  oligarchy  in 
fact ; *  and  this  character  was  retained  by  the  American 
colonial  borough,  at  least  so  far  as  its  frame  of  government 
went. 

The  council       Each  of  the  colonial  boroughs  accordingly  had  its  council ; 
coioidai        and  this  body  was,  as  in  England,  made  up  of  aldermen  and 
boroughs,      councilmen    sitting    together.     The    number    of    aldermen 
was  small,  usually  six  or  eight.     In  most  of  the  boroughs. 

1  For  further  information  on  this  point,  see  Munro's  Government  of 
European  Cities  (New  York,  1909),  209-221. 

180 


THE  CITY   COUNCIL  181 

they  were  elected :  but  in  a  few  they  were  chosen  by  the 
"corporation,"  that  is  to  say,  by  the  mayor,  aldermen,  and 
councillors.  There  were  from  six  to  twenty-four  councillors, 
chosen  either  by  the  freeholders  or  by  the  corporation. 
As  already  said,  the  aldermen  and  councillors  did  not  form 
two  separate  bodies,  but  met  always  together;  and  there 
was  jittle  difference  between  them,  save  that  the  aldermen 
often  had  some  special  functions  to  perform,  chiefly  of  a 
judicial  nature.  The  mayor  of  the  colonial  borough  was 
a  member  of  the  council  and  its  presiding  officer  f  but  he  had  itsorgani- 
no  veto  power  over  its  acts,  and,  as  a  rule,  no  right  to  appoint  powers80 
any  of  the  borough  officials.  The  council  as  a  whole,  made 
up  as  it  was  of  mayor,  aldermen,  and  councillors,  framed  the 
local  ordinances,  voted  and  spent  the  borough  appropria- 
tions, and  attended  to  such  administrative  tasks  as  there 
were ;  but  administration,  as  it  is  now  understood,  was  not 
then  of  much  importance,  for  the  colonial  borough  provided 
very  little  for  its  citizens  in  the  way  of  public  services. 
Rather  curiously,  the  chief  tasks  imposed  upon  members 
of  the  council  were  neither  administrative  nor  legislative, 
but  judicial.  The  mayor  and  aldermen,  together  with  the 
recorder,  formed  the  borough  court,  which  held  its  weekly 
or  fortnightly  sessions  for  the  trial  of  criminal  and  civiL 
cases. 

After  the  Revolution  great  changes  took  place  in  both  The  city 
the  organization  and  the  functions  of  municipal  councils,  after  the 
The  practice  of  dividing  the  aldermen  into  two  bodies  with  Revolutloa 
distinct   powers   was   adopted    by   some   cities,    and    soon 
spread  to  others,  till  before  long  the  bicameral  council  be- 
came a  general  feature  of  tfhe  American  municipal  system. 
Soon  the  "corporation"  as   a  self-perpetuating  body  was 
everywhere  abolished,  both  aldermen  and  councillors  being^ 
now  _  elected  by  direct  popular  voteT    The  mayor  was  not 
yet  elected,  and  in  most  cities  he  still  ranked  merely  as  the 


182  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

presiding  officer  of  the  council  and  not  as  a  separate  adminis- 
trative official ;  but  in  course  of  time,  as  the  principle  of 
division  of  powers  gained  recognition  in  municipal  organi-^ 
zation,  his  independence  was  established    With  this  step, 
came  the  mayor's  veto  power  over  the  councils  acts.1 
its  position       During  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century,  however. 
firet'lfaif  °     the  council  retained  its  dominating  position  in  municipal 
teenthmne~   anCa^rsji    T^6  niembers  of  both  its  branches  were  elected  by 
century.        popular  vote,  which  came  generally  to  mean  manhood  suf- 
frage;   and  it  had  all  the  prestige  attaching,  in  a  vigorous 
democracy,  to  an  authority  so  selected.     As  administrative 
functions  developed,  they  were  intrusted  by  the  council  to 
its  own  committees ;    and  as  the  work  expanded  the  com- 
mittees   multiplied.     The    police,  fire  protection,    schools, 
streets,  and  similar  services  went  into  the  immediate  charge 
of    council    committees.     Although    the    council    retained 
formal  charge  of  the  whole  field  of  municipal  administration, 
these  various  committees  naturally  developed T  in  time,  a 
great  degree  of  independence;   for  the  councils  had  grown 
so  large  that  it  was  practically  impossible  for  the  whole 
body  to  give  detailed  supervision   to   the  work  which  de- 
veloped with  urban  growth.     By  the  middle  of  the  nine- 
its  dom-       teenth  century,  therefore,  the  city  council  had  reached  a 

mating  i  •         i         A  •  ..,"  .  .        . 

position  place  in  the  American  municipal  system  quite  as  dommat- 
*°*  ing  as  that  occupied  by  the  borough  council  in  the 
English  system  at  the  present  time.  The  mayor,  it  is  true, 
had  acquired  much  independent  authority;  but  in  most 
American  cities  the  council  not  only  constituted  the  munici- 
pal legislature,  but  also,  through  its  numerous  committees, 
directed  the  purely  administrative  functions  of  the  city. 
The  period  1840-1850  may,  accordingly,  be  said  tfl  ha.vp 
marked  the  hevdav  of  conciliar  supremacy  in  the  frame  of_ 
American  city  government. 

1  See  above,  pp.  10-11. 


THE   CITY  COUNCIL  183 

Then  came  a  reaction.  The  rapid  growth  of  cities  due  The  city 
to  the  heavy  immigration  of  the  later  forties  put  a  new  strain  ^ 
upon  the  machinery  of  city  government ;  moreover,  the 
councils  seem  to  have  everywhere  declined  in  the  caliber 
of  their  membership.1  Between  the  two  causes  the  system 
of  administration  by  council  committees  soon  encountered 
trouble.  The  committees  now  had  far  more  work  to  do, 
and  they  were  not  so  competent  to  do  it  as  they  had  been ; 
hence  it  was  done  poorly  and  the  citizens  complained.  As_ 
important  departments  of  city  administration  became  de- 
moralized through  the  inefficiency  or  the  partisanship  of 
the  committees  that  had  them  in  charge,  appeals  were  made 
to  the  state  authorities  for  intervention.  The  states  re-  state  in- 
sponded,  but  their  responses  took  different  forms.  In  some 
cases  the  state  legislature  amended  the  city  charter  by  tak- 
ing the  administration  of  various  municipal  departments 
away  from  the  council  committees  and  giving  it  to  newly 
established  administrative  officials  or  to  boards  chosen  by 
popular  vote.2  In  other  cities  the  administrative  functions 
of  the  mayor  were  expanded  at  the  expense  of  the  council ; s 
and  in  still  others  some  departments  were  removed  from 
municipal  control  altogether,  and  vested  in  the  hands  of 
authorities  appointed  by  the  state.4 

This  movement  for  reducing  the  administrative  authority 

1  This  decline  has  commonly  been  attributed  to  the  influence  of  the 
alien  influx  combined  with  the  system  of  manhood  suffrage ;  but,  as  Pro- 
fessor Goodnow  has  pointed  out  (City  Government  in  the  United  States,  140- 
141),  the  decline  in  caliber  had  begun  before  the  tide  of  immigration 
reached  anything  like  its  real  strength. 

2  An  independent  water  board  was  established  in  Chicago  by  state  law 
in  1851 ;    during  the  year  following  several  administrative   boards   and 
officers  were  provided  for  in  Cleveland ;   and  in  1857  Detroit  began  the 
creation  of  independent  boards. 

J  This  was  the  case  in  Boston,  Chicago,  Philadelphia,  and  Baltimore 
during  the  years  1854-1857. 

4  In  1857  the  legislature  established  a  state  park  commission  and  a 
state  police  board  for  New  York,  Brooklyn,  and  the  territory  adjoining. 


184 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


impair- 


administra- 

tive  powers. 


Differences 


American 

municipal 

develop- 

ment  dur- 

ing  the 


of  the  municipal  council  gained  headway  in  all  the  larger 
cities>  until,  before  long,  its  progress  resulted  in  confining 
^he  council's  sphere  of  influence  to  local  legislation.  As 

t  ~ 

the  council  s  powers  dwindled,  its  membership  declined  in 
quality;  and  as  it  grew  less  dependable  in  personnel  more 
checks  were  put  upon  it.  In  the  thirty  or  forty  years 
following  1850  the  council  was  in  many  cities  transformed 
from  the  dominant  factor  in  the  municipal  system  to  a 
body  whose  chief  tasks  were  to  make  local  by-laws  and  pass 
the  annual  appropriations.  Its  other  powers  had  gone  to 
the  mayor,  or  to  various  executive  officials  and  boardsT  or. 
in  a  few  CftsesT  to  statft-appnintftfl  nnmmissinna.  A  com- 
parison of  the  Boston  charters  of  1854  and  1885  affords 
a  good  illustration  of  the  way  in  which  the  balance  of  power 
had  during  the  intervening  three  decades  been  shifted  from 
the  council  to  the  executive  organs  of  city  government.1 

It  is  somewhat  noteworthy  that  during  the  same  period 
nothing  of  the  kind  took  place  in  the  cities  of  anv  other 
country.  In  England  the  city  council  lost  none  of  its  powers 

_—•—•••»» 

during  the  second  half  of  the  nineteenth  century,  but  man- 

.  .  i  •   i     •        i          •* 

aged  rather  to  increase  the  authority  which  it  already  pos- 
sessed. The  same  is  true  of  corresponding  bodies  in  the 
cities  of  continental  Europe.  In  none  has  there  been  a 
clear  separation  between  legislative  and  administrative 
powers,  and  in  none  has  the  executive  encroached  upon  the 
legislature.  The  English  city  still  administers  its  various 
public  services  through  standing  committees  of  the  munic- 
ipal council,  just  as  it  did  three-quarters  of  a  century  ago  ; 
and,  although  central  supervision  of  local  affairs  has  mean- 
time greatly  increased  its  rigor,  the  English  municipal  coun- 
cil has  to-day  more  work  to  do,  and  more  authority  to  do  it, 
than  at  any  previous  time.  In  American  cities,  on  the 
other  hand,  dissatisfaction  with  the  conduct  of  municipal 

»  Acts  and  Resolves  of  Massachusetts,  1854,  ch.  448,  and  1885,  ch.  266. 


THE   CITY   COUNCIL  185 

affairs  has  wreaked  its  vengeance  on  the  council,  until,  as 
a  result  of  persistent  shearing,  its  powers  are  in  general 
scarcely  a  tithe  of  what  they  were  half  a  century  ago. 

To  describe  the  present-dav  organization  and  powers  Present 
of  the  council  in  American  cities  is  not  easy,  for  the  reason  ticm'o^ 
that  these  features  are  alike  in  hardly  any  two  of  them.  council3- 
Each  of  the  forty-eight  states  has  its  own  laws  relating  to 
these  matters,  and  in  most  of  them  different  arrangements 
have  been  established  by  special  charters  for  different  cities. 
Thus  it  has  come  to  pass  that  even  in  the  elements  of  or- 
ganization there  is  no  uniformity.  Some  cities  have  a 
council  of  two  branches;  others  have  a  single  chamber. 
It  has  been  estimated  that  in  the  United  States  as  a  whole 
only  about  one-third  of  all  the  cities  of  over  25,000  popula- 
tion have  the  two-chamber  system;  and  in  the  cities  that 
have  populations  below  this  figure  the  proportion  is  probably 
even  smaller.  Of  the  ten  largest  cities  in  the  country,  New 
York,  Chicago,  Boston,  Cleveland,  and  San  Francisco  have 
a  single-chamber  council;  while  an  equal  number,  Phila- 
delphia, St.  Louis,  Baltimore,  Pittsburgh,  and  Buffalo,  re- 
tain the  bicameral  system.1 

The    two-chamber    system    is    defended    upon    various^  Merits 
grounds.     It  is  urged,  for  example,  that  as  a  check  upon 


hasty  and  ill-considered  action  the  double  chamber  is  as  chamber 

system. 

appropriate  in  city  as  in  state  government  ;  but  it  may  well 
be  doubted  whether,  when  both  branches  of  the  council  are 
elected  by  popular  vote,  the  bicameral  system  performs  any 
real  service  in  this  direction.  In  practice  the  same  political 
party  is  likely  to  dominate  both  branches  of  the  council, 
and  when  this  happens  the  same  machine  leaders  are  almost 
certain  to  dictate  the  action  of  both  bodies.  Under  such 
circumstances  one  branch  is  no  check  upon  the  other.  On 
the  other  hand,  when  different  political  organizations  con- 
1  A.  R.  Hatton,  Digest  of  City  Charters  (Chicago,  1906),  74. 


186 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Adapta- 
bility of  the 
bicameral 
system  to 
the  city's 
official 
needs. 


Single 
chambers 
too  easily 
controlled. 


trol  the  two  branches,  they  are  liable  to  check  each  other  so 
effectually  that  only  an  understanding  between  the  two  party 
machines  can  avail  to  release  a  permanent  deadlock.  Such 
understandings,  it  is  needless  to  say,  are  usually  the  fruit  of 
anteroom  compromises  in  which  the  interests  of  the  city  are 
sacrificed  for  the  benefit  of  the  party  organizations  concerned. 
Again,  it  is  frequently  asserted  that,  owing  to  the  varied 
character  of  the  tasks  which  a  city  council  has  to  perform, 
two  branches  of  different  structure  and  size  are  necessary. 
Some  things  of  a  semi-executive  nature  which  come  before 
the  council  with  great  frequency  (such  as  the  granting  of 
locations  in  the  city  streets)  can,  it  is  urged,  best  be  handled 
in  a  body  of  ten  or  a  dozen  members ;  whereas  other  matters, 
such  as  the  voting  of  appropriations,  ought  properly  to  come 
before  a  much  more  numerous  branch,  the  members  of  which 
represent  every  section  of  the  city  and  every  interest  of  the 
citizens.  In  reply  to  this  contention,  however,  it  has  been 
pointed  out  that  the  first  class  of  matters  ought  not  to  come 
before  the  city  legislature  at  all,  or  before  any  branch  of  it ; 
that,  being  quasi-executive  in  nature,  they  belong  to  some 
purely  administrative  board ;  and  that  in  any  case  their 
proper  handling  scarcely  demands  a  permanent  division  of 
the  city  council  into  two  bodies.  Another  persistent  no- 
tion is  that,  since  a  single  chamber  is  more  susceptible  to 
sinister  influence,  to  domination  by  some  powerful  corporate 
interest,  the  double-chamber  system  constitutes  a  useful 
public  safeguard.  This  idea,  which  is  no  doubt  deeply 
rooted  in  the  public  mind,  overlooks  two  very  important 
matters  of  everyday  fact.  One  is  the  commonplace  of 
political  science,  that  the  only  public  safeguard  in  such_ 
things  is  the  personal  integrity  of  the  councilmen.  Tf  |fhf> 
individual  members  of  the  council  be  deficient  in  this,  it 
matters  very  little  whether  their  number  be  large  or  small, 
or  whether  they  be  grouped  into  one  or  two  branches.  On 


THE   CITY   COUNCIL  187 

the  other  hand,  if  men  of  adequate  moral  fibre  be  put  into 
public  office,  it  matters  about  as  little  whether  they  be  few 
or  many,  and  whether  they  sit  together  or  do  their  work  in 
different  rooms. 

The  other  phase  of  the  question  which  this  argument  in  Thebi- 
favor  of  the  bicameral  council  overlooks  is  the  fact  that  council  as 


quite  as  many  opportunities  for  evil  arise  from  a  council's 
versatility  in  impeding  business  as  from  its  power  to  rush 
things  through  with  unseemly  haste.  If  a  single  chamber 
can  by  malign  pressure  be  too  easily  stampeded  into  a 
vote  which  is  not  in  the  interest  of  the  citizens,  it  is  just 
as  true  that  a  double  chamber  affords  to  every  blackmailing 
political  influence  an  undue  advantage  in  blocking  the  patfy 
of  measures  which  a.ra  ]n  thp!  r.if.y's  interest.  The  history  of 
American  city  councils  furnishes  quite  as  many  examples 
of  malfeasance  in  one  direction  as  in  the  other.1 

It  may  be  urged,  furthermore,  that  the  bicameral  system  The  double- 
engenders  profitless  delay  and  needless  friction  ;    that  it 


precludes  the  city  from  pursuing  the  prompt  and  business-  ^ucea  fnc" 
like  methods  of  private  organizations  ;  that  it  is  out  of 
harmony  with  the  arrangements  which  exist  in  the  best-gov- 
erned cities  of  other  countries  ;  that  the  majority  of  American 
cities,  which  do  not  have  the  system,  get  along  quite  as  well 
as  the  minority,  which  do  have  it  ;  and  that  no  city  which 
has  in  recent  years  abolished  the  double  chamber  shows  any 
desire  to  restore  it.  In  general  the  bicameral  system  has 
been  losing  ground,  and  the  strong  probability  is  that  it 
will  continue  to  do  so. 

When  there  is  a  two-chambered  council,  one  branch  is  Nomencia- 
usually  called  the  Board  of  Aldermen,  the  other  the  Common  councils. 

1  For  other  arguments,  pro  and  con,  see  a  paper  by  the  Hon.  Samuel 
B.  Capen  on  "One  or  Two  Legislative  Chambers,"  and  one  by  John  A. 
Butler  on  "A  Single  or  a  Double  Council,"  in  Proceedings  of  the  National 
Municipal  League  for  1896. 


188 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Terms  of 
councilmen 


Qualifies- 


Council.  Sometimes,  however,  another  name  is  given  to 
the  upper  branch ;  in  Philadelphia,  for  example,  it  is  called 
the  Select  Council,  and  in  St.  Louis  the  House  of  Delegates. 
In  size  there  is  great  variation  among  city  councils.  At 
the  head  of  the  list  is  Philadelphia,  with  forty-one  members 
in  one  branch  of  its  council  and  one  hundred  and  forty- 
nine  in  the  other.  New  York  and  Chicago  have  single 
chambers,  comprising  seventy-nine  and  seventy  members 
respectively.  San  Francisco,  however,  has  a  council  of 
eighteen  members,  called  supervisors;  and  the  Boston 
council  contains  nine  members  only.  When  a  council  has 
two  branches,  the  members  of  the  upper  branch  are 
usually  elected  for  either  a  two-year  or  a  four-year  term; 
members  of  the  lower  branch  are  in  most  cases  chosen 
for  one  or  two  years,  the  latter  term  being  the  more 
common,  except  in  the  cities  of  New  England,  where 
the  practice  of  electing  councilmen  annually  is  still  main- 
tamed.1  When  terms  are  short,  reelections  are  common; 
but  in  any  event  councilmen  seldom  serve  more  than  six 
or  eight  years.  In  this  respect  the  traditions  of  American 
cities  differ  very  widely  from  those  of  English  municipalities, 
where  service  of  ten  or  even  twenty  years  at  the  council- 
board  is  not  at  all  unusual. 

As  a  rule,  any  qualified  voter  may  become  a  candidate  for 
election  to  either  branch  of  a  city  council  T  but  in  some  cities, 
an  additional  residence  requirement  is  imposed.2  In  a  few 
places  it  is  stipulated  that  aldermen  and  councilmen  shall 
be  at  least  twenty-five  years  of  age ; 3  and  in  at  least  one  city, 

1  A  chapter  in  J.  A.  Fairlie's  Essays  in  Municipal  Administration  (New 
York,   1908),  entitled  "American  Municipal  Councils,"  contains  much 
carefully-compiled  information  concerning  council  organization  in  vari- 
ous cities  throughout  the  United  States. 

2  In  Philadelphia  four  years,  in  San  Francisco  five  years. 

*  In  Philadelphia  and  New  Orleans,  for  example.  In  St.  Louis  the  age 
limit  is  thirty. 


THE   CITY   COUNCIL  189 

Detroit,  there  is  an  elementary  educational  qualification 
which  is  not  exacted  from  voters,  namely,  that  of  being  able 
"to  read  and  write  the  English  language  intelligibly."  Many 
city  charters  also  contain  the  stipulation  that  a  member  of 
the  council  shall  not  hold  any  other  public  office,  that  he  shall 
not  be  pecuniarily  interested  in  any  contract  to  which  the 
city  is  a  party,  and  that  no  one  who  has  ever  been  convicted 
of  any  violation  of  a  public  trust  shall  be  elected  to  the 
board.  In  no  city  is  a  special  property  qualification 
exacted,  nor  is  any  previous  experience  in 


quired  or  even  expected.  The  municipal  council  represents 
the  lowest  rung  in  the  ladder  of  American  public  life.  It  is 
where  many  men  begin  what  they  hope  will  prove  a  political 
career  ;  but  not  many  of  them  manage  to  get  much  higher. 
This  is  because  the  municipal  council,  especially  in  the  larger 
cities,  does  not  attract  men  of  real  ability  or  business  ca- 
pacity, a  fact  which  has  been  so  often  commented  upon  that  General 
it  has  ceased  to  excite  any  surprise.  It  does  not  get  even  municipal 
fair  material.  Very  rarely  is  it  true  nowadays  that  any  m)"nacil" 
considerable  percentage  of  the  councillors  are  owners  of 
property;  indeed,  it  would  probably  be  found,  in  most 
large  cities,  that  at  least  three-fourths  of  them  contribute 
nothing  to  the  city  treasury  but  an  annual  poll-tax.  In 
Boston,  just  before  the  common  council  of  seventy-five  mem- 
bers was  abolished,  it  was  said  that  the  total  sum  which 
they  paid  in  taxes  did  not  equal  the  annual  cost  of  a  single 
city  laborer.  Only  a  few  of  them  owned  any  property  at 
all;  the  rest  were  assessed  for  poll-taxes,  and  even  these 
small  sums  could  in  some  cases  be  collected  only  by  de- 
ducting them  from  the  monthly  stipends  of  the  councilmen. 
In  many  American  cities  about  the  only  practical  require- 
ments for  election  to  the  council  are  that  the  candidate  shall 
have  given  proof  of  loyalty  to  his  political  party  :  that  he 
shall  have  no  substantial  hl|]fiinpgg  "q™»g,  fr>r  h**  ^11  pt 


190  GOVERNMENT   OF   AMERICAN   CITIES 

a  large  part  of  his  time,  not  to  the  actual  duties  of  his  office; 
but  to  his  own  rQle  in  the  continuous  vaudeville  of  ward 
politics ;  that  he  be  glib  of  tongue,  an  active  canvasser 
for  votes,  not  vindictive,  not  ungrateful.,  and  not  over- 
scrupulous. 

Pay  of  Most  cities  pay  their  aldermen  and  councillors.    The  al- 

m™.  dermen  of  New  York  receive  $2000  per  year;  councilmen 

in  Boston  and  Chicago  get  $1500 ;  in  smaller  cities  the  re- 
muneration is  $1000  or  less.  Of  the  largest  cities,  Phila- 
delphia and  Pittsburgh  are  the  only  ones  that  give  their 
municipal  legislators  no  remuneration ;  but  many  smaller 
cities  pursue  this  policy.  The  caliber  of  councilmen  seems. 
however,  to  be  in  no  way  related  to  the  salaries  paid.  When 
a  substantial  remuneration  is  given,  places  at  the  council- 
board  are  often  sought  by  men  whose  ability  would  not  com- 
mand such  return  in  any  private  employment.  On  the 
other  hand,  when  cities  pay  only  a  nominal  stipend,  or  noth- 
ing at  all,  men  who  have  other  interests  to  engage  their 
attention  are  deterred  from  the  sacrifice  which  service  in 
the  council  demands  of  them.  Hence  most  of  the  candi- 
dates for  election  come  from  the  ranks  of  those  who  have 
nothing  to  sacrifice  and  who  hope  to  secure  in  a  roundabout 
way  some  recoupment  for  anv  time  they  may  give  the  city.1 
It  is  coming  to  be  felt  that  cities  would  find  it  profitable 
to  reduce  their  councils  materially  in  size,  and  proportion- 
ately increase  the  salaries  paid  to  councilmen. 

Methods  of  There  are  three  systems  of  selecting  members  of  mu- 
nicipal councils,  —  election  by  wards  or  other  districts,  elec- 
tion at  large,  and  election  by  a  combination  of  both  these 
methods.  The  first  method  is  most  commonly  followed  in 
the  choice  of  a  single-chambered  council,  and  it  is  also 

1  This  question  is  further  discussed  in  a  paper  by  J.  N.  Pryor,  entitled, 
"Should  Municipal  Legislators  receive  a  Salary?"  in  Proceedings  of  the 
National  Municipal  League  for  1896. 


THE   CITY   COUNCIL  191 

almost  invariably  used  in  the  selection  of  members  for  the 
larger  branch  of  a  bicameral  council.  Under  the  ward 
system  each  district  of  the  city  chooses  oneT  two,  or  three 
councillors.  Chicago,  for  example,  elects  two  from  each  of 
its  thirty-five  wards;  Philadelphia  chooses  the  one  hun- 
dred and  forty-nine  members  of  its  common  council  from 
its  forty-one  wards,  each  ward  having  representation  in 
proportion  to  its  population.  Boston  and  San  Francisco 
are  about  the  only  large  cities  that  elect  all  their  council- 
men  (numbering  nine  and  eighteen,  respectively)  on  a  gen- 
eral city  ticket :  but  many  cities  that  have  two  chambers 
elect  the  members  of  the  smaller  branch  in  this  way. 

Much  has  been  said  and  written  concerning  the  relative  Relative 
merits  of  the  ward  and  general-ticket  systems  of  choosing 
municipal  councillors,  and  it  is  often  alleged  that  the  ward 
system  has  been  responsible  in  no  small  degree  for  the  me-  systems 
diocrity  of  the  men  usually  selected.  Petty  districts  choose 
petty  men,  —  so  the  saying  runs.  The  ward  councillor 
represents  his  own  ward,  and  that  alone.  He  forgets  that 
the  city  is  more  than  the  sum  of  its  wards,  and  that  the 
public  opinion  of  the  city  may  be  different  from  the  total- 
ity of  neighborhood  clamors.  Ward  divisions  are  at  best 
ephemeral ;  unlike  the  French  arrondissement,  the  American 
ward  has  rarely  any  traditions  and  as  a  unit  of  area  exacts 
no  spontaneous  loyalty  from  the  people  who  live  in  it. 
What  passes  for  ward  loyalty  is,  more  commonly  than  not, 
local  prejudice  fostered  by  politicians  to  serve  their  own 
personal  ends.  Moreover,  the  concentration  of  single 
ethnic  elements  in  particular  sections  of  the  nitv  makes  it" 
practically  certain  that,  under  the  ward  system,  some  mem- 
bers of  the  council  will  owe  their  election  to  nothing  but  their 
proficiency  in  appealing  to  racial  or  religious  or  social 
narrowness.  The  ward  system  likewise  affords  a  standing 
incentive  to  that  most  vicious  of  all  American  contributions 


192  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

to  the  science  of  practical  politics,  the  gerrymander:  it 
makes  possible  the  control  of  a  majority  in  the  council  by  a 
minority  of  the  city's  voters;  and,  unless  redistricting  is 
resorted  to  frequently,  it  fosters  gross  inequalities  in  repre- 
sentation. The  term  "ward"  has  accordingly  come  into 
disrepute  in  the  terminology  of  American  government,  a 
somewhat  curious  fact,  by  the  way,  since  in  England,  where 
councillors  are  and  always  have  been  chosen  from  wards, 
no  such  odium  has  been  developed.  Its  presence  here  is 
doubtless  explained  by  the  fact  that  in  America  ward  repre- 
sentation, ward  politics,  and  ward  organization  have  come 
to  be  associated  in  the  public  mind  with  bossism,  trickery, 
and  almost  everything  else  that  is  politically  demoralizing. 
A  feeling  so  deeply  lodged  can  scarcely  be  without  some 
substantial  foundation. 

The  ward  One  thing,  however,  the  ward  system  has  in  its  favor: 
represents-  it  does  secure  what  many  voters  seem  to  regard  as  the  only 
real  representation  of  their  special  interests  in  the  city  gov- 
ernment, and  it  does  insure  a  certain  amount  of  geographical 
and  political  variety  in  the  make-up  of  the  municipal  council. 
It  is  the  failure  of  the  general-ticket  system  to  afford  ade- 
quate guarantees  on  these  points  that  has  hindered  its  more 
extensive  adoption.  Under  a  system  of  election  at  large 
it  is  entirely  possible  for  all  the  councillors  to  come  from  one 
section  of  the  citv.  or  at  any  rate  from  a  few  of  the  many 
sections;  and  it  is  not  only  possible,  but  probable,  that  if 
the  municipal  ballot  bears  party  designations,  as  it  usually 
does,  they  will  all  come  from  one  political  party.  When 
nominations  are  made  by  political  conventions,  it  can  usually 
be  arranged  to  give  the  various  geographical  sections  of  the 
city  due  recognition  on  the  slate  of  candidates ;  but  when 
nominations  are  made  by  direct  primaries  or  by  petition 
this  cannot  very  easily  be  done.  In  such  cases  some  sec- 
tions are  liable  to  be  left  without  representation  among 


THE   CITY   COUNCIL  193 

the  candidates  whose  names  go  on  the  ballot;  and  since, 
when  a  political  party  stands  loyally  by  its  whole  slate  of 
candidates,  it  will  elect  them  all,  the  minority  party  is 
wholly  unrepresented  in  the  council.  In  Boston,  some  years 
ago,  when  the  thirteen  members  of  the  board  of  aldermen 
were  elected  at  large,  one  political  party  regularly  managed 
to  capture  the  whole  quota,  until  the  legislature  intervened 
and  required  by  statute  that  voters  should  mark  their  bal- 
lots for  not  more  than  seven  candidates,  although  thirteen 
were  to  be  chosen.1  Thenceforth  the  majority  party  in 
the  city  was  assured  of  seven  aldermen,  while  the  minority 
party  secured  the  remaining  six ;  but  the  board  was  always 
so  closely  balanced  politically  that  deadlocks  were  fre- 
quent, and  the  city's  business  was  greatly  obstructed  in 
consequence. 

These  objections  to  the  system  of  electing  councillors  at  Arguments 
large  merely  beg  the  question  as  to  whether  either  geographi- 
cal  or  political  representation  is  a  thing  to  be  desired.  Are 
not  different  sections  of  the  city,  however  diverse  they  may  real  basis. 
be  in  their  racial  or  social  or  economic  features,  entirely  at 
one  in  their  common  interest  concerning  the  city  as  a  whole  ? 
Can  any  policy  which  is  to  the  advantage  of  the  whole  body 
of  citizens  be  of  permanent  disadvantage  to  citizens  of  any 
one  race  or  creed  or  neighborhood  ?  The  plea  for  ward  repre- 
sentation rests  upon  the  affirmative  of  this  proposition. 
As  for  the  service  which  the  ward  system  is  reputed  to  ren- 
der in  assuring  due  representation  to  a  minority  political 
party,  many  persons  are  disposed  to  deny  that  it  is  a  service 
at  all,  since  it  rests  upon  the  premise  that  the  regular  politi- 
cal parties  have  a  necessary  place  in  municipal  affairs  and 
hence  should  be  officially  recognized  and  their  interests  duly 

1  Somewhat  similar  arrangements  for  securing  minority  representation 
have  at  various  times  been  tried  in  other  cities,  notably  in  New  York  and 
Chicago.  In  no  case  have  they  proved  satisfactory. 


194 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Nomina- 
tions of 
candidates 
for  election 
to  the 
council. 


Election 
machinery. 


regarded  in  the  composition  of  the  city  government.  Such 
doctrines  are  supported  neither  by  reason  nor  by  experience, 
and  they  are  quite  out  of  harmony  with  the  present-day  drift 
of  public  sentiment.  Those  American  cities  which  have, 
reorganized  their  administrative  arrangements  during  the^ 
last  ten  years  have,  without  exception,  striven  to  lessen  the 
recognition  given  to  political  partiesT  Important  steps  to 
this  end  have  been  the  reduction  of  the  council  in  size 
and  the  removal  of  party  designations  from  the  mu- 
nicipal ballot.  With  the  adoption  of  these  features  the 
chief  reasons  for  the  ward  system  of  election  disappear. 

Candidates  for  election  to  the  council  are  nominated  in  a 
variety  of  ways.  In  a  few  cities  the  ward  or  city  caucus  still 
remains;  in  some  the  party  convention  chooses  candidates 
for  election  at  large.  Many  cities  have  replaced  both  caucus 
and  convention  by  the  party  primary,  each  party  holding 
its  own  primary  and  choosing  its  own  official  candidates. 
In  Massachusetts  (except  in  Boston  and  those  cities  that 
have  adopted  the  commission  form  of  government)  the  joint 
party  primary  is  used,  both  parties  choosing  their  candidates 
on  the  same  day  and  at  the  same  ballot-boxes.  During 
recent  years  some  cities,  particularly  those  which  have 
adopted  the  commission  type  of  government,  have  used  the 
non-partisan  primary,  at  which  candidates  are  selected 
without  regard  to  their  party  affiliations.  Boston  nominates 
its  nine  councilmen  by  petitions  bearing  each  the  signatures 
of  at  least  5000  qualified  voters ;  and  the  few  cities  that 
elect  councilmen  by  a  system  of  preferential  voting  have 
no  elaborate  nominating  machinery  at  all.  The  merits 
and  defects  of  these  various  plans  of  nomination  have  been 
discussed  in  a  previous  chapter.1 

Elections  for  the  city  council  are  everywhere  conducted 
by  secret  ballot,  and  in  almost  all  cases  the  so-termed 

1  Above,  ch.  vi. 


THE   CITY   COUNCIL  195 

Australian  ballot  is  used.  In  many  cities  the  ballot  contin- 
ues to  bear  a  party  designation  after  the  name  of  each  candi- 
date for  election  to  the  council,  and  thus  puts  a  premium 
upon  party  regularity  among  the  voters.  A  plurality  of 
votes  is  sufficient  to  elect  a  councillor ;  hence,  as  there  are 
usually  more  than  two  candidates  for  the  same  vacancy,  it 
very  frequently  happens  that  a  councilman  is  chosen  bv  a 
minority  of  the  voters.  Elections  may  be  voided  on  the 
usual  grounds;  but  in  most  cities  the  council  is  the  sole 
judge  of  the  qualifications  of  its  members,  and  decides, 
among  other  things,  whether  or  not  a  councilman  was 
properly  elected.  Being  a  partisan  body,  it  is  more  apt 
to  render  its  decision  upon  partisan  grounds  than  upon 
the  real  facts  of  the  case.  After  election  the  councillors 
qualify  by  taking  a  prescribed  oath  of  office. 

In  organization  and  procedure  municipal  councils  are  Theorgani- 
much  alike  throughout  the  United  States.1  Regular  meet-  procedure 
ings  take  place  at  the  city  hall,  weekly  in  the  larger  cities, 
fortnightly  or  monthly  in  the  smaller.  Special  meetings 
may  be  held  when  a  certain  number  of  members  ask  for  them. 
In  a  few  cities,  notably  in  Chicago  and  Providence,  the 
mayor  presides  at  all  council  meetings ;  but  as  a  rule  the^ 
council,  or  each  branch  of  it,  selects  its  own  president.  This  is 
done  at  the  first  meeting  after  an  election,  and  a  clear  majority 
of  votes  is  usually  necessary ;  hence  the  selection  of  a  pre- 
siding officer  is  not  infrequently  delayed  for  weeks  or  even 
months,  through  the  inability  of  a  majority  of  the  members 
to  agree  upon  a  choice.  Where  party  discipline  is  good, 
however,  the  selection  is  virtually  made  at  a  preliminary 
caucus  by  the  members  of  the  majority  party  in  the  council. 
The  presidents  of  the  board  of  aldermen  and  the  common 
council  are  usually  chosen  for  a  single  year.  The  council, 

1  There  is  a  good  discussion  of  this  matter  in  Eugene  MoQuillin's  Law 
of  Municipal  Corporations,  II.  ch.  xiii. 


196  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

furthermore,  determines  its  own  rules  of  procedure.  At 
its  opening  meeting  it  ordinarily  readopts  the  regulations  of 
the  preceding  year,  with  such  incidental  changes  as  may  be 
deemed  desirable.  Each  branch  of  a  city  council  has  its  own 
code  of  rules;  but  these  rarely  differ  much,  and  methods 
are  more  or  less  uniform  in  different  cities.  The  rules  are 
usually  capable  of  suspension  either  by  unanimous  consent 
or  by  a  two-thirds  vote;  and  such  suspensions  are  more 
frequent,  perhaps,  than  they  ought  to  be. 

Councfl  Most  of  the  routine  work  which  a  city  council  has  to  do  is 

performed  through  standing  committees^  When  there  are 
two  branches  of  the  council,  there  are  joint  committees 
made  up  of  members  from  each  branch;  but,  if  either 
branch  has  special  functions  apart  from  the  other,  that 
branch  will  also  have  some  separate  committees  of  its 
own.  In  a  large  city  the  council  will  have  from  a  dozen  to 
thirty  or  forty  regular  committees,  each  made  up  of  from 
three  to  nine  members.  The  city  council  of  Boston,  before 
its  reorganization  in  1909,  had  no  fewer  than  forty-two 
joint  standing  committees,  fully  half  of  which  had  only 
nominal  functions  to  perform.  Some  council  committees 
are  very  influential  bodies,  with  many  questions  of  real 
importance  to  consider.  Perhaps  the  best  example  is  the 
finance  committee,  or  the  committee  on  appropriations ;  but 
the  standing  committees  on  streets,  police,  health,  water  sup- 
ply, and  fire  protection  also  have  a  great  many  important 
matters  to  deal  with  every  year.  The  committees  on  pub- 
licity, statistics,  sinking  funds,  or  contingencies  have,  for 
the  most  part,  only  perfunctory  duties  and  often  hold  no 
meetings  at  all. 

How  com-         Very  naturally,  the  councillors  all  want  places  on  the  major 

chosen.         committees,  and  more  particularly  chairmanships  of  them; 

consequently,  much  pressure  is  brought  to  bear  from  all  sides 

upon  the  appointing  authority.     In  a  few  cities  this  authority 


THE   CITY   COUNCIL  197 

is  a  committee  chosen  at  the  beginning  of  each  year  to  frame 
slates  of  standing  committees  ;  but  in  most  places  all  com- 
mittees are  appointed  by  the  president  of  the  council.  When 
there  are  two  branches,  the  chairman  of  each  names  a  quota 
from  his  own  chamber  to  serve  upon  the  joint  committees. 
This  system  of  course  gives  the  presiding  officer  a  great 
deal  of  patronage,  and  too  often  is  a  means  of  enabling  him 
to  pay  the  price  of  his  election  ;  for  not  infrequently  can- 
didates for  election  to  the  presidency  of  city  councils  get 
much  of  their  strength  by  promising  committee  chairman- 
ships or  places  on  important  committees  to  those  councilmen 
who  are  ready  to  support  their  candidacy.  The  committee 
slates,  accordingly,  are  more  often  framed  with  a  view  to  the 
fulfilment  of  ante-election  pledges  than  with  a  purpose  to 
secure  upon  committees  men  who  are  best  qualified  to  deal 
with  the  special  matters  that  will  come  before  therrL  This 
being  the  case,  it  is  not  surprising  that,  as  a  rule,  the  reports 
and  recommendations  of  the  council's  standing  committees 
carry  no  considerable  weight  with  the  council  as  a  whole. 

Herein  the  English  and  American  systems  of  committee  English  and 
administration  differ  greatly.     In  the  council  of  an  English 


city  the  recommendation  of  a  standing  committee  on  any  committees 

compared. 

matter  within  its  particular  field  of  jurisdiction  is  practically 
decisive.  That  is  because  the  English  city  council  chooses 
its  own  committees,  putting  upon  them  the  aldermen  and 
councillors  who  seem  best  qualified  by  training  and  experience^ 
to  deal  with  the  matters  in  hand,  and  endeavoring  to  keen 
the  same  men  on  the  same  committees  as  long  as  thev 
remain  members  of  the  council-1  The  recommendations  of 
committees  so  constituted  deserve  and  receive  weight,  be- 
cause they  embody  the  conclusions  of  men  who,  though 
laymen,  have  become  experts  in  their  special  fields  of  ad- 

1  See  the  data  on  this   point  given   in  Munro's  Government  of  Euro- 
pean  Cities  (New  York,  1909),  284-285. 


198  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

ministration.  Members  of  American  council  committees, 
on  the  other  hand,  chosen  as  they  are  not  by  the  council  but 
by  the  presiding  officer,  have  seldom  any  special  proficiency 
at  the  outset,  and  they  are  not  usually  allowed  to  serve  long 
enough  to  acquire  it  by  experience.1  Realizing  this,  the 
councillors  as  a  whole  are  disposed  to  regard  the  judgment  of 
a  committee  as  no  better  than  their  own  individual  opinions 
upon  the  matter  in  question ;  hence  they  set  aside  committee 
recommendations  without  much  compunction.  This  con^ 
dition  of  things  has  tended  to  deprive  committeemen  of  an 
adequate  sense  of  final  responsibility,  to  put  a  premium 
upon  haphazardness  in  committee  work,  and  in  general  to 
discredit  the  committee  system.  Yet  large  councils  must  do 
much  of  their  work  through  committees ;  they  are  by  their 
very  size  precluded  from  handling  directly  the  host  of 
matters  which  come  before  them  and  must  be  studied 
with  care.  Accordingly,  the  propaganda  for  smaller  citv 
councils  derives  some  of  its  support  from  the  feeling  that, 
since  the  committee  system  cannot  be  made  to  serve  the 
cause  of  efficient  administration,  the  only  feasible  alternar 
tive  is  to  remove  the  necessity  for  its  existence. 

Powers  oi  The  powers  of  the  American  city  council  defy  any  attempt 
counciL  a*  concise  summary.  In  no  two  cities  are  they  exactly 
alike,  and  even  in  the  same  city  they  change  from  time  to 
time  as  the  result  of  special  statutory  enactment.  In  most 
municipalities,  however,  except  those  which  have  adopted 
commission  government,  the  powers  of  the  council  rep- 
resent a  residuum;  they  are  no  more  than  the  remnants 
of  a  once  comprehensive  jurisdiction  which  has  been 

1  Newly  elected  councilmen  are  at  first  put  upon  unimportant  com- 
mittees. After  reelection  they  expect  assignment  to  committees  of 
greater  importance ;  a  councilman  who  serves  three  or  four  terms  expects 
a  "promotion"  in  each  term.  This  means  that,  unless  he  has  proved  a 
failure  in  committee  work,  he  is  not  left  for  more  than"a  single  term  on  onj 
commitj 


THE  CITY  COUNCIL  199 

steadily  dwindling  during  the  last  forty  or  fifty  years.  Such 
powers  as  still  remain  may  be  conveniently  classified  under 
the  two  heads  of  legislative  and  administrative  authority; 
but,  as  the  former  group  is  much  the  more  important,  it 
should  for  purposes  of  study  be  subdivided  into  various 
subsidiary  divisions. 

The  legislative  powers  of  city  councils  extend,  first  of  all,  1- 
to  such  matters  relating  to  the  general  structure  of  municipal 
government  as  are  not  provided  for  in  the  city  charter  or 
the  general  statutes.  It  may  be  laid  down  as  a  common, 
rule  of  law  that,  when  any  power  seems  to  appertain  to  a 
municipal  corporation  and  the  city  charter  is  silent  as  to 
the  manner  in  which  such  power  shall  be  exercised,  the 
city  council  may  determine  the  matter.1  This  it  usually 
does  by  ordinance  ;  but  it  may,  under  certain  limitations,  («)  general  ; 
proceed  by  mere  resolution  As  a  rule,  the  city  charter  and 
the  statutes  cover  all  the  essentials  of  municipal  organization. 
They  determine  the  structure  of  government,  the  terms  of 
officers,  their  compensations,  and  their  duties;  but  if  they 
fail  to  make  detailed  provisions  on  such  points  the  city 
council  may  do  so. 

In  the  second  place    the  legislative  powers  of  the  city  (&>  ordi- 
council  usually  include  the  riflht  to  make  ordinances  in 


exercise  of  the  municipality's  police  power.2    Within  this  pollce 

•—•••••  i     r        J        IT  i     i         r          in  power  ; 

rather  broad  field  is  comprised  suitable  local  legislation  for  the 
protection  of  life  and  property,  as  well  as  for  the  preserva- 
tion of  the  public  health  and  morals.  Ordinances  relating  to 
traffic  in  the  streets  ;  the  establishment  of  fire  limits  and  the 
regulation  of  fire  hazards  ;  building  laws  ;  sanitary  and 
health  regulations  ;  ordinances  providing  for  the  inspection 

1  Cascaden  v.  Waterloo,  106  Iowa,  673. 

1  A  full  discussion  of  this  topic  may  be  found  in  the  chapter  on  "Ordi- 
nances exercising  the  Police  Power  "  in  J.  F.  Dillon's  Law  of  Municipal 
Corporations  (5  vols.,  Boston,  1911),  I.  ch.  xvi. 


200  GOVERNMENT   OF   AMERICAN   CITIES 

of  goods  offered  for  sale,  or  for  standardizing  weights  and 
measures ;  restrictions  upon  the  storage  of  dangerous  ma- 
terials; bill-board  regulations;  rules  governing  theatres  and 
other  places  of  amusement :  all  these  afford  examples  of 
the  exercise,  by  legislation,  of  the  local  police  power.  Au- 
thority  to  make  some  of  these  regulations  is  now  and  then 
intrusted  to  some  special  administrative  board.  Traffic  in 
the  streets,  for  example,  may  be  put  within  the  jurisdiction 
of  the  street  commissioners  or  of  the  police  authorities; 
the  making  of  sanitary  regulations  is  often  turned  over  to 
the  municipal  board  of  health.  But  when  such  disposition 
has  not  been  made  by  the  city  charter  or  by  other  statutory 
enactment,  the  power  to  regulate  all  these  matters  by 
ordinance  belongs  to  the  city  council,  subject,  of  course,  to 
the  general  restrictions  governing  the  validity  of  municipal 
ordinances.1  In  the  larger  cities  the  tendency  has  on  the 
whole  been  to  take  more  and  more  of  this  authority  away 
from  the  council  and  to  vest  it  in  the  hands  of  the  adminis- 
trative q.nt.hnritifia.  State  laws,  moreover,  are  steadily 
trenching  upon  the  field,  in  some  cases  leaving  very  little 
to  be  handled  by  any  city  authority. 

(c)  finan-  The  city  council's  legislative  powers,  again,  include  various 
matters  connected  with  municipal  finance.  In  most  cities 
the  council  determines  the  annual  tax-rale^  but  it  does  not 
decide  what  property  may  be  levied  upon,  this  matter  being 
almost  always  fixed  by  state  law.  The  council  often, 
but  not  always,  grants  exemptions  and  abatements  in 
taxation  matters.  It  also  malces  the  annual  appropriations. 
Sometimes  these  appropriations  are  put  together  into  a  bud- 
get and  laid  before  the  council  by  one  of  its  own  committees ; 
more  often  the  list  is  prepared  by  the  mayor,  and  in  a  few 
cities,  including  New  York,  by  a  board  of  estimate  and  appor- 
tionment. But,  however  the  appropriations  may  originate, 
1  C/.  above,  pp.  86-89. 


THE   CITY   COUNCIL  201 

they  can  become  effective  only  with  the  assent  of  the  council. 
The  charters  of  a  few  cities,  notably  those  of  New  York  and 
Boston,  provide  that  the  council  may  in  no  case  increase 
items  in  the  budget,  and  shall  not  even  have  a  free  hand  in 
decreasing  appropriations  laid  before  it.  In  New  York,  for 
example,  changes  in  the  budget  even  by  way  of  decrease 
may  be  made  against  the  will  of  the  mayor  only  by  a 
three-fourths  vote  of  the  council;  in  Boston  the  council 
may  in  no  case  increase  the  estimates,  and,  save  with  the 
mayor's  approval,  may  reduce  them  only  by  a  two-thirds 
vote.  In  most  other  cities  the  council  may  augment  or  di- 
minish the  appropriations,  subject,  of  course,  to  a  veto  of 
such  action  by  the  mayor.1  The  city  council,  again,  con- 
tinues to  be  an  important  factor  in  the  exercise  of  the  city's 
borrowing  powers.  All  loan  orders,  whether  authorizing 
temporary  or  bonded  indebtedness,  must  as  a  rule  have  its_ 
assent.  The  council,  it  is  true,  is  not  the  only  authority 
possessing  power  to  borrow  on  the  credit  of  the  city.  Not 
infrequently  the  legislature  gives  this  right  to  water  boards, 
park  boards,  or  other  administrative  bodies.  In  general, 
however  borrowing  projects  must  go  before  the  council 
for  consideration. 

Within  the  council's  legislative  jurisdiction,  likewise,  falls  (d)  fran- 

chis68  * 

the  determination  of  many  general  matters  relating  to  the 
provision  of  public  utilities.2  In  most  American  cities 
the  municipal  council  has  authority,  usually  under  very  strin- 

1  For  a  discussion  of  many  interesting  matters  pertaining  to  the  methods 
of  making  municipal  appropriations,  which  cannot  be  considered  here, 
the  reader  is  referred  to  the  chapter  on  "Principles  of  Budget  Making" 
in  F.  A.  Cleveland's  Municipal  Administration  and  Accounting  (New  York, 
1909),  and  to  the  publications  on  this  subject  issued  from  time  to  time 
during  the  last  five  years  by  the  New  York  Bureau  of  Municipal  Re- 
search. 

2  This  branch  of  the  council's  powers  is  dealt  with  at  length  in  O.  L. 
Pond's  Municipal  Control  of  Public  Utilities  (New  York,  1906),  especially 
chs.  viii.-x. 


202  GOVERNMENT   OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 

gent  limitations  prescribed  by  the  state  constitution  or  by 
statute,  to  grant  such  franchises  to  pubUc-servicecorDorationa 
as  the  convenience  of  the  citizens  may  require,  and  to  deter- 
mine  the  duration  and  detailed  provisions  of  such  franchises. 
On  the  whole,  no  municipal  power  has  been  more  grossly 
abused  than  this.  It  is  as  a  franchise  authority  that  the 
city  council  has  achieved  its  acme  of  inefficiency  and  in- 
competence. Accordingly,  in  keeping  with  the  usual  policy 
of  depriving  subordinate  authorities  of  any  power  which 
they  show  a  disposition  to  abuse,  many  states  have  put 
stringent  limitations  on  the  franchise  prerogative  of  the 
city  councils.  Sometimes  by  constitutional  or  statutory 
enactments  they  forbid  them  to  grant  franchises  for  a  longer 
period  than  twenty  or  thirty  years,  or  they  make  all  votes 
of  councils  relative  to  franchises  subject  to  popular  referen- 
dum. Sometimes,  again,  they  arrogate  to  themselves  a  part 
at  least  of  the  franchise-granting  power,  and  exercise  it 
directly.  The  role  of  the  city  council  in  this  field  has  become 
steadily  less  important.  On  the  other  hand,  when  the  city 
itself  owns  and  operates  any  public  serviceT  such  as  a  water 
or  a  lighting  plant,  the  council  usually  possesses  the  right 
to  regulate  by  ordinance  the  terms  and  incidents  of  such 
service.  In  most  cases  the  service  is  in  the  immediate 
administrative  jurisdiction  of  a  special  board  or  commis- 
sioner, and  the  council  merely  determines  broad  matters 
of  general  management.  The  question  as  to  whether 
the  administration  of  municipal  services  by  authorities 
independent  of  the  council  is  a  policy  which  makes  for 
efficiency  need  not  be  discussed  at  this  point.  It  will 
be  approached  from  a  somewhat  different  angle  in  a  later 
chapter.1 

(e)  mis-  Finally,  there  is  a  considerable  group  of  miscellaneous 

matters  to  which  the  ordinance  power  of  the  city  council 

1  Below,  ch.  x. 


THE   CITY  COUNCIL  203 

extends.1  These  do  not  lend  themselves  very  readily  to 
classification,  but  they  embrace  such  things  as  the  fix- 
ing of  locations  for  city  buildings,  the  acceptance  or  rejec- 
tion of  permissive  powers  granted  to  the  city  by  statute,  the 
passing  of  resolutions  that  indicate  to  the  legislature  the 
city's  attitude  on  matters  of  pending  legislation,  and  so  on. 

Despite  its  narrowed  authority,  the  average  city  council  Thecoun 
deals,   therefore,   with  a   goodly  variety  of   matters,   and 
it  is  not  surprising  that   its   annual   output  of   municipal  lty 
ordinances,  orders f  and  resolutions  is  very  large.     The  re- 
vised ordinances  of  Chicago  make  up  two  solid  volumes  of 
over  a  thousand  pages  each,  and  other  large  cities  make  a 
nearly  equal  showing.     Each  year  a  good-sized  document  is 
required  to  promulgate  new  ordinances  and  amendments  to 
old  ones.     No  limit  is  fixed  either  by  law  or  by  public  opinion 
to  the  number  of  ordinances  that  a  city  council  may  enact 
on  matters  within  its  purview ;    the  only  requisites  are 
that  the  measures  shall  all  be  enacted  in  due  form,  and  shall 
not  be  unreasonable  or  oppressive  in  character,  but  general  in 
their  application  and  consistent  with  the  policy  of  the  state 
as  expressed  in  its  statute-books.      Since,  however,  these 
limitations  have  by  judicial  decisions  been  applied  in  different 
states  with  varying  degrees  of  strictness,  it  is  only  by  a  careful 
study  not  only  of  the  laws  but  of  the  precedents  that  one  can 
tell  whether  a  council  has  or  has  not  the  authority  to  deal 
with  any  given  matter.     Only  a  trained  lawyer  can  give  an 
accurate  answer  to  such  a  question,  and  even  he  cannot 
always  be  sure  of  his  ground.     Hence  it  is  that  a  council 
rarely  acts  upon  any  new  legislative  project  without  first 
ascertaining  the  scope  of  its  rights  from  the  city's  law  de- 
partment.    As  for  the  ordinary  citizen,  he  is  presumed  to 

1  The  exact  powers  of  the  council  in  any  city  can  be  ascertained  only 
by  a  special  study  of  the  municipality  in  question.  Some  useful  informa- 
tion, however,  with  references  to  authoritative  sources,  may  be  found  in 
A.  R.  Hatton's  Digest  of  City  Charters  (Chicago,  1906),  107-228. 


204  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

know  both  the  laws  and  the  ordinances  of  the  community 
in  which  he  lives,  a  legal  fiction  that  does  not  lose  any  of  its 
absurdity  by  reason  of  the  fact  that  it  is  necessary  as  a  work- 
ing principle  of  judicial  administration.  The  whole  mass 
of  municipal  law  is  set  before  the  public  with  only  a  pretence 
of  classification;  ordinances  are  passed,  amended,  and  re- 
pealed with  bewildering  frequency ;  and  the  entire  body  of 
city  ordinances  is  no  sooner  codified  than  the  oncoming 
flood  of  amending  enactments  sweeps  away  much  of  its 
value  as  a  trustworthy  guide.  Narrowing  the  city  council's 
legislative  juridiction  has  certainly  not  reduced  its  legislative 
output. 

2.  Ad-  Then  there  are  the  administrative  powers  of  city  councils. 

^s  a  ma-tter  of  political  theory,  city  councils  ought  to  have 
no  administrative  powers ;  but  as  a  matter  of  fact  they  do 
perform  such  functions,  and  in  many  cities  this  part 
of  their  work  is  of  much  importance.  In  some  cities,  both 
large  and  small,  the  council  still  retains  the  right  to  make 
appointments  to  certain  municipal  offices ; 1  in  those  in 
whichthe  mayor  makes  the  appointment,  the  council  (or, 
where  there  are  two  chambers,  the  upper  branch  of  it)  must 
confirm  such  appointment  before  it  becomes  effective.  The 
merits  and  faults  of  this  system  are  discussed  elsewhere  ;2  but 
wherever  it  exists  it  is  a  substantial  power.  In  a  few  cases 
contracts  can  be  awarded  only  with  the  council's  consent. 

Most   CJtV   P.o^yiP.ila.  fiir+.hprm^rA    havfi   thft   rifrh^   to   rftqiiirft 

stated  reports  from  the  various  administrative  departments, 
and  they  may  investigate  any  of  these  departments  when 
they  choose  to  do  so.  These  powers  are  not  intended 
to  give  ihe  council  any  right  to  interfere  in  the  direct  ad- 
ministration of  city  departments,  but  not  infrequently  they 
have  been  made  to  serve  this  purpose.  As  the  report  of  the 

1  The  city  clerk,  for  example,  is  usually  chosen  by  the  council. 
*  Below,  ch.  ix. 


205 

Boston  Finance  Commission  disclosed,  a  large  part  of  the 
time  of  a  city  council  may  be  spent  in  discussing  questions 
relating  to  contracts,  to  the  hiring  of  labor,  or  to  the  mayor's 
appointments,  with  none  of  which  has  it  any  legal  right 
to  interfere.1  What  the  council  cannot  bring  about  as  a 
body,  moreover,  individual  councilmen  usually  manage  to 
secure.  Many  of  them  spend  their  time  in  besieging  the 
mayor  and  the  heads  of  departments  to  appoint  their  friends 
to  places  on  the  city  pay-roll^  to  give  out  minor  contracts  to 
political  supporters,  or  to  order  supplies  from  favored 
stores.  If  heads  of  departments,  trying  to  perform  the 
duties  laid  upon  them  by  law,  refuse  such  appeals,  their 
official  lives  are  made  miserable  by  scurrilous  attacks  at 
council  meetings,  where  men  can  utter  slanders  under  the 
cloak  of  privilege,  or  can  prefer  trumped-up  charges  as  the 
basis  of  demands  for  council  investigation  into  the  affairs  of 
departments.  In  this  extra-legal  and  wholly  indefensible 
fashion  city  councils  have  in  matters  of  pure  administration 
often  exerted  powers  which  the  city  charter  never  intended 
to  bestow.  The  reason  for  all  this  is  not  far  to  seek.  Patron- 
age is  administrative,  not  legislative.  Councils  that  confine 
themselves  strictly  to  legislative  functions  not  only  find  com- 
paratively little  that  excites  the  real  interest  of  their  mem- 
bers, but  have  small  opportunity  to  give  councilmen  any- 
thing that  will  serve  to  increase  their  own  political  strength. 
The  power  to  influence  the  patronage  that  usually  goes  with 
administrative  authority  is  what  the  councilmen  in  most 
cities  seem  to  want ;  and  they  reach  out  after  it  even  when 
charter  provisions  attempt  to  put  it  far  beyond  their  grasp. 

The   principle  of   separation  of    powers,   as   applied    to  The  place  of 
local  government,  has  come  to  mean  that  the  city  executive  in  contem- 
shall  have  most  of  the  real  authority,  and  that,  under  the  P°rary  C1*y 

government. 

name    of   legislative    jurisdiction,    the    council    may   have 
1  Boston  Finance  Commission,  Reports,  II.  197  (1909). 


206  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

whatever  is  left.  The  whole  trend  has  been  in  the  direction 
of  reducing  the  council  to  a  body  which  makes  minor  ordi- 
nances, passes  the  appropriations  with  no  power  to  increase 
them  in  amount,  authorizes  borrowing  when  necessary,  and 
does  little  more.  The  only  marked  reaction  against  this 
tendency  is  to  be  found  in  those  cities  which,  by  adopting 
the  commission  form  of  government,  have  cast  overboard 
the  traditional  principle  of  division  of  powers.  Save  in  so 
far  as  the  city  council  may  profit  by  the  abandonment  of  this 
principle,  there  are  no  signs  that  it  will,  in  its  orthodox 
form,  ever  regain  its  former  position  of  prestige  and 
influence. 

REFERENCES 

On  the  historical  development  of  the  municipal  council  in  America  there 
is  considerable  material  in  the  general  references  mentioned  on  p.  28, 
above,  particularly  in  J.  A.  Fairlie's  chapter  on  "Municipal  Development 
in  the  United  States,"  in  his  Municipal  Administration  (New  York,  1901). 
The  organization,  procedure,  and  powers  of  city  councils  can  be  accu- 
rately studied  only  in  the  charters  and  ordinances  and  official  handbooks 
of  the  various  municipalities ;  but  a  useful  summary  of  such  matters  may 
be  found  in  A.  R.  Hatton's  Digest  of  City  Charters  (Chicago,  1906).  J.  A. 
Fairlie's  Essays  in  Municipal  Administration  (New  York,  1908)  contains 
an  excellent  chapter  on  "American  Municipal  Councils";  and  there  are 
informing  general  discussions  of  the  subject  in  Professor  F.  J.  Goodnow's 
Municipal  Government  (New  York,  1909),  ch.  x.,  and  Municipal  Problems 
(New  York,  1904),  ch.  ix.,  in  D.  F.  Wilcox's  American  City  (New  York, 
1904),  ch.  ix.,  and  in  E.  D.  Durand's  articles  on  "Council  Government 
versus  Mayor  Government"  in  Political  Science  Quarterly,  XV.  426,  675 
(Sept.,  Dec.,  1900).  Several  papers  dealing  with  various  phases  of  the 
council's  organization  and  powers  have  appeared  from  time  to  time  in  the 
Proceedings  of  the  National  Municipal  League.  Among  these  may  be 
mentioned  "The  Reform  of  our  Municipal  Councils,"  by  Henry  W.  Wil- 
liams (1896) ;  "The  Legislature  in  City  and  State,"  by  Horace  E.  Deming 
1897);  "Should  Municipal  Legislators  receive  a  Salary?"  by  James 
W.  Pryor  (1896) ;  "A  Single  or  a  Double  Council?"  by  John  A.  Butler 
(1896);  "Shall  we  have  One  or  Two  Legislative  Chambers?"  by  the 
Hon.  Samuel  B.  Capen  (1896);  and  "The  Necessity  of  Distinguishing 
Legislation  from  Administration,"  by  F.  J.  Goodnow  (1898).  The  Mu- 
nicipal Program,  issued  by  the  National  Municipal  League  (New  York, 
1900),  contains  some  interesting  recommendations  in  regard  to  the  organ- 
ization and  powers  of  the  council. 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE  MAYOR 

As  an  independent  organ  of  local  government  the  mayor-  The 
alty  is  a  distinctively  American  development.  It  does  not 
have  any  exact  counterpart  in  the  cities  of  Great  Britain  or 
continental  Europe,  for  there  the  chief  magistrate  of  the 
city  is  chosen  by  the  municipal  legislature  and  serves  as 
its  presiding  officer.1  The  development  of  the  office  of 
mayor  to  independence,  and  in  the  natural  course  of 
events  to  power,  has  been  the  outstanding  feature  of  the 
nineteenth  century  in  the  evolution  of  American  municipal 
institutions,  and  is  one  of  the  most  striking  results  of  the 
emphasis  laid  upon  the  doctrine  of  divided  powers. 

In  the  boroughs  of  the  colonial  period  there  was,  as  has  its  deveiop- 
been  pointed  out  in  previous  chapters,  no  attempt  to  separate 
administrative  from  legislative  functions  in  local  govern- 
ment.2 The  sole  organ  of  borough  administration  wfjp,  t^*A 
council ;  and  of  thislaody  the  mayor  was  simply  the  presiding 
officer,  as  he  is  in  English  boroughs  at  the  present  dav.3 
Sometimes  the  mayor  was  appointed  by  the  governor  of  the 
colony  in  which  the  borough  was  located ;  in  other  boroughs 
he  was  chosen  by  the  councillors  from  among  their  own  i.  in  the 
number ;  and  in  a  few  instances  he  was  elected  by  popular 
vote,  although  this  method  was  never  in  any  borough  a  regu- 

1  In  the  cities  of  Great  Britain  and  France  the  mayor  presides  in  the 
single-chambered  council ;  in  the  cities  of  the  German  Empire  the  burgo- 
master presides  in  the  upper  branch  of  the  bicameral  council. 

*See  above,  ch.  i.,  especially  pp.  14-8. 

J  In  some  of  the  Southern  boroughs  the  term  "intendant"  was  used  to 
designate  the  chief  municipal  officer. 

207 


208  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

lar  practice.1  The  mayor  of  the  colonial  borough  held  office 
for  a  single  year  only,  and  he  served  without  pay.2  But 
the  distinguishing  feature  of  his  office  was  that  it  gave  him  no 
special  powers.  He  was,  to  be  sure,  the  presiding  officer  at 
meetings  of  the  council,  and,  as  a  rule,  he  had  a  vote  like  the 
other  members;  but  he  had  no  veto  power,  no  exclusive 
right  of  proposing  expenditures,  and  no  authority  to  nomi- 
nate or  appoint  borough  officers.  In  a  few  colonial  towns, 
notably  in  New  York  and  Albany,  he  was  intrusted  with 
certain  minor  functions,  such  as  the  licensing  of  taverns,  the 
supervision  of  the  market,  the  determination  of  petty  suits 
at  law,  and  the  holding  of  coroners'  inquests ; 3  but  the  pre- 
Revolutionary  American  mayor  could  not  in  any  sense  be 
regarded  as  an  independent  administrative  officer  like  his 
descendant  of  the  present  day. 

2.  After  the  The  Revolution  and  the  adoption  of  the  national  constitu- 
te™ 1  tion  brought  in  a  new  theory  of  administration,  which  soon 
wrought  a  change  in  the  position  and  powers  of  the  mayor. 
Ample  evidence  of  this  change  appears  in  the  Baltimore- 
charter  of  1796,  which  provided  that  the  mayor  should  be_ 
chosen,  for  a  two-vear  term,  by  a  miniature  electoral  college^ 
the  members  of  which  were  fo  be  elected  by  the  voters  of  the 
TheBaiti-  city,  two  from  each  of  the  eight  wards.  Only  property- 
owners  were  eligible  to  the  office,  and  the  mayor  was 
to  receive  an  annual  salary.4  In  all  this  the  influence  of 
the  so-termed  federal  analogy  appears  very  plainly.  Even 
more  distinctly,  however,  it  is  shown  in  the  extent  and  nature 


1  In  New  York  he  was  appointed  by  the  governor ;  in  Philadelphia 
he  was  chosen  by  the  council  from  among  the  aldermen ;  only  in  the 
smaller  boroughs  was  he  ever  elected,  and  even  there  not  very  often. 

*  In  practice  re-appointments  were  very  common. 

8  For  a  more  detailed  statement  of  powers  vested  in  the  colonial  mayor, 
see  J.  A.  Fairlie's  Essays  in  Municipal  Administration  (New  York,  1908), 
68-69. 

*  Laws  of  Maryland,  1796,  ch.  68. 


THE   MAYOR  209 

of  the  powers  which  the  charter  intrusted  to  the  mayor. 
In  the  first  place,  the  mayoral  veto  here  makes  what  is  pre- 
sumably its  first  appearance  in  a  city  charterj  for  one  of  the 
provisions  permitted  the  mayor  to  veto  any  ordinance  or  reso- 
lution of  the  Baltimore  council,  with  the  limitation,  however, 
that  the  veto  might  be  overridden  by  a  three-fourths  vote. 
In  the  second  place,  the  mayor  was  invested  with  certain 
powers  of  appointment :  but  his  discretionary  authority  in 
this  direction  was,  for  the  time  being,  closely  restricted 
by  the  requirement  that  he  must  make  all  his  appointments 
from  lists  submitted  to  him  by  the  aldermen.  Finally,  by 
the  terms  of  this  charter  the  mayor  was  charged  with  the 
enforcement  of  all  the  city  ordinances :  he  mi^ht  call  for, 
financial  statements  from  the  officers  of  the  city  treasury 
at  any  time^  and  he  was  authorized  to  make  recommenda- 
tions to  the  city  council. 

It  is  at  this  early  point,  the  closing  years  of  the  eighteenth  influence  of 
century,  that  we  find  the  principle  of  division  of  powers  mak-  analogy! 
ing  its  way  down  from  the  national  and  state  constitutions 
into  the  charters  of  cities  and  gaining  in  the  latter  a  firm 
anchorage.  The  mayor  is  no  longer  a  chief  colleague  among 
the  councilmen,  with  no  special  rights  except  that  of  presiding 
at  the  council  meetings.  He  begins  to  take  rank  as  an  inde- 
pendent organ  of  local  government,  with  powers  that  were 
somewhat  restricted,  it  is  true,  but  of  such  a  nature  that 
they  were  sure  to  increase  in  scope  and  importance.  During 
the  earlier  years  of  the  nineteenth  century  several  other 
cities  either  obtained  revisions  of  their  old  charters  or 
secured  new  ones,  and  in  practically  all  of  these  documents 
some  of  the  more  important  features  of  the  Baltimore  charter 
were  embodied.  The  idea  of  choosing  the  mayor  bv  a 
system  of  indirect  election  seems  to  have  had  little  popularity. 
however ;  instead,  most  cities  preferred  and  adnptft^  thft 
plan  oj  electing  their  mayors  bv  direct  popula^*  vnfy}.  Boston 


210 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


3.  During 
the  earlier 
part  of  the 
nineteenth 
century. 


4.  During 
the  mid- 
century 
period. 


was  among  the  earliest  to  follow  this  course,  which  was  en- 
joined in  her  first  charter,  in  1822.  Other  cities  followed, 
Philadelphia  in  1826,  New  York  in  1834. 

In  extension  of  its  powers  the  office  of  mayor  can  hardly  be. 
said  to  have  made  much  headway  during  the  first  quarter  of 
the  nineteenth  century.  The  Boston  charter  01  i»zz  gave 
the  mayor  somewhat  broader  appointing  prerogatives  than 
those  contained  in  the  Baltimore  charter  of  1796,  for  in 
Boston  the  mayor  might  appoint  whom  he  chose,  subject, 
however,  to  confirmation  by  the  aldermen ;  but,  on  the  other 
hand,  it  gave  him  no  veto  power.  Indeed,  such  extension  of 
mayoral  powers  as  occurred  during  this  quarter-century  was 
due  not  so  much  to  new  authority  granted  by  charters  as  to 
the  personal  aggressiveness  of  some  of  the  men  who  held 
the  office.  An  interesting  example  is  afforded  by  the 
character  of  the  second  mayor  of  Boston,  Josiah  Quincy,  who 
showed  during  his  term  how  expansive  were  even  the  re- 
stricted charter  powers  when  applied  by  one  who  cared  to 
exercise  them  fully.1 

During  the  years  prior  to  the  middle  of  the  century  the 
balance  of  power,  as  between  mayor  and  council,  was  fairly 
well  maintained.  The  mayor  was  an  influential,  but  not  a 
dominant,  factor  in  city  affairs ;  for,  even  where  he  had  gained 
the  veto  and  appointing  powers,  the  council  still  held  a  firm 
hand  over  the  various  municipal  departments,  supervising 
them  directly  through  its  committees  and  retaining  full  control 
over  city  finance.  As  time  went  on,  however,  the  balance  was 
slowly  but  surely  shifted  over  to  the  executive :  the  council 

1  "  The  second  mayor  (Quincy)  determined  to  use  all  the  powers  that 
ingenuity  could  spell  out  of  the  city  charter  to  the  end  of  concentrating 
responsibility  and  control.  The  means  adopted  by  him  to  secure  this 
result  was  to  make  himself  chairman  of  all  the  important  committees  of 
the  board  of  aldermen,  and  thus  personally  to  become  familiar  with  all  the 
details  of  the  executive  business  of  the  city,  and  responsible  for  the  man- 
agement of  them."  —  NATHAN  MATTHEWS,  City  Government  of  Boston 
(Boston,  1895),  166. 


THE   MAYOR  211 

lost  ground.  The  reason  why  it  lost  ground  has  already 
been  discussed.1  Where  it  lost,  the  mayor  eventually  gained. 
Functions  taken  from  the  council  were  often  given  to  newly- 
established  boards,  which,  although  at  the  outset  elected 
directly  by  the  people  and  still  in  some  cases  so  chosen,  were 
in  time  usually  transferred  to  the  category  of  officers  over 
which  the  mayor's  appointing  powers  extended.2  In  other 
cases,  functions  taken  from  the  council  were  given  to  state- 
appointed  boards.  In  1860,  for  example,  the  Maryland 
legislature  transferred  the  police  administration  of  Baltimore 
to  a  state  board,  and  a  year  later  the  legislature  of  Illi- 
nois did  the  same  thing  for  Chicago.  In  1865  the  legis- 
lature of  New  York  took  from  the  council  of  the  metrop- 
olis its  control  of  fire  protection,  public  health,  and  licensing, 
and  put  all  these  powers  into  the  hands  of  state  boards. 
But  there  soon  came  a  reaction  against  this  state  interference 
in  the  affairs  of  city  departments,  and  in  some  cases  the 
legislature  restored  local  control.  Let  it  be  noted,  however, 
that  it  restored  control  over  these  departments  not  to  the 
council,  but  to  local  boards,  the  members  of  which  wer& 
thenceforth,  as  a  rule,  to  be  appointed  by  the  mayor.  In 
several  cities,  accordingly,  a  substantial  increase  hi  the 
mayor's  powers  came  about  through  a  term  of  state  inter- 
ference. The  state  took  powers  from  the  council,  exercised 
these  powers  for  a  time  through  its  own  appointive  officials, 
and  then  handed  them  back  to  the  appointees  of  the 
mayor. 

1  Above,  ch.  viii. 

2  The  reason  for  this,  as  elsewhere  explained,  may  be  found  in  the  fact 
that  popular  election,  as  a  method  of  selecting  members  of  administrative 
boards,  proved  a  complete  disappointment.     As  managers  of  city  depart- 
ments the  council  committees  were  inefficient  and  wasteful;    and  the 
boards  elected  by  popular  vote  in  the  larger  cities  were  not  appreciably 
better,  for  they  were  too  often  composed  of  men  whose  qualifications  were 
simply  and  purely  political,  and  who  brought  to  the  supervision  of  their 
departments  no  administrative  skill  or  capability  whatever. 


212 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


6.  During 
the  last 
fifty  years. 


Develop- 
ment not 
uniform 
throughout 
the  United 
States. 


.  Other  extensions  of  the  mayor's  powers  were  made  as  the 
second  half  of  the  century  progressed.  The  practice  of 
requiring  that  his  appointments  should  be  confirmed  by  the 
aldermen  came  to  be  looked  upon  with  disfavor  in  some 
cities,  and  in  1882  Brooklyn  made  bold  to  abolish  it.  New 
York  soon  followed  this  lead ;  other  cities  of  the  state  came 
into  line  a  little  later;  and  in  time  various  cities  in  other 
parts  of  the  country  adopted  the  plan  of  giving  the  mayor  a 
rather  free  hand  in  appointments.  Even  yet,  however,  the 
old  practice  still  holds  firm  in  the  great  majority  of  American 
cities ;  but,  as  charters  are  revised,  the  drift  is  unmistakably 
away  from  it.  In  the  field  of  municipal  finance  the  mayor 
has  also  made  substantial  gains  during  the  last  few  decades. 
It  was  at  one  time  the  prevailing  right  of  the  council  to  pre- 
pare the  annual  budget,  but  this  right  has  now  in  many  cities 
passed  to  the  mayor.  So,  too,  have  the  power  to  approve 
the  award  of  contracts,  and  various  other  functions  formerly 
within  the  purview  of  the  municipal  legislature.  Alonff  with 
all  this  has  fione  a,  tendency  to  extend  the  term  for  which  the 
mayor  is  elected,  to  make  his  stipend  larger,  and  to  afford 
him  increased  facilities  for  the  ful^  exercise  of  his  broad- 
authority. 

Now,  while  this  development  of  the  office  of  mayor  to  a 
dominating  position  in  American  municipal  administration 
can  be  clearly  followed  in  a  general  way  when  one  views  the 
country  as  a  whole,  it  has  not  proceeded  so  far  in  some  cities 
as  in  others.  In  places  like  New  York  and  Boston  the 
powers  of  the  mayor  have  dwarfed  into  insignificance  the 
authority  of  the  municipal  councils ;  but  of  cities  like  Chicago 
and  Philadelphia  this  is  not  at  all  true,  for  the  councils  of 
these  cities  still  maintain  a  tenacious  grip  upon  their  con- 
siderable share  in  local  administration.  It  is  impossible, 
therefore,  in  describing  the  place  and  powers  of  the  mayor  in 
American  cities,  to  say  anything  broadly  or  without  large 


THE   MAYOR  213 

reservation.  Any  assertion  as  to  the  functions  of  the  mayor 
in  one  English  city  would  hold  true  of  English  mayors  in 
general,  and  any  outline  of  the  authority  possessed. by  the 
burgomaster  of  Cologne  or  Charlottenburg  might  be  applied 
without  any  important  modification  to  any  other  Prussian 
city.  But  of  the^  larger  cities  of  the  United  States  it  may; 
almost  be  said  that  whatever  functions  are  intrusted  to  the 
mayor  in  one  city  are  in  another  city  quite  likely  to  be 
lodged  in  the  hands  of  some  one  else^  There  is,  in  fact, 
hardly  a  single  statement  concerning  the  jurisdiction  of  the 
mayor  in  this  country  that  would  hold  true  of  anything  like 
all  the  cities,  and  very  few  statements  that  would  apply  to 
even  a  maj  ority  of  them.  Nevertheless,  the  essential  features 
of  the  office  can  at  least  be  set  forth  in  general  terms,  though 
any  such  description  must  necessarily  wind  its  way  through  a 
difficult  maze  of  local  variations. 

The  mayor  is  in  practically  all  American  cities  elected  Method  of 
by  direct  popular  vote.  Candidates  for  this  office  are  e 
nominated  by  the  same  procedure  that  is  established  in  the. 
various  cities  ipr  the  nomination  of  the  other  elective  officers  • 
the  election  is  everywhere  by  secret  ballot ;  and  a  plurality 
of  votes,  except  in  one  or  two  cities  that  have  adopted  the 
system  of  preferential  voting,  is  sufficient  to  elect.  The  Term. 
term  of  office  varies  from  one  to  five  years.  Many  cities  in 
New  England  continue  the  annual  term,  a  relic  of  town- 
government  days ;  but  most  cities  of  medium  size  throughout 
the  land,  and  probably  a  majority  of  the  entire  number  of 
whatever  size,  have  a  two-year  mayoral  term.  A  very  few 
have  adopted  three  years ;  and  a  dozen  or  more,  chiefly  cities 
of  the  largest  population,  have  lengthened  the  mayor's 
term  to  four  years.  Among  the  latter  are  New  York, 
Philadelphia,  Chicago,  St.  Louis,  Boston,  and  Baltimore, 
the  six  largest  cities  of  the  country ;  but  in  Boston,  as  else- 
where explained,  the  mayor  may  be  recalled  from  office 


214 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Tendency 
toward 
longer 
terms. 


Reasons 
in  favor 
of  longer 
terms. 


at  the  end  of  two  years.1     Jersey  City  alone  has  adopted 
the  five-year  term. 

The  tendency  to  give  mayors  longer  terms  in  office  has  been 
very  marked  during  the  last  ten  or  fifteen  years.  Many 
cities  have  lengthened  the  period  from  one  to  two  years; 
and  those  which  now  leave  their  mayors  in  office  for  four 
years  have,  for  the  most  part,  changed  to  this  policy  during 
the  last  decade.  In  the  larger  cities  the  impression  that  a 
two-year  term  is  unprofitably  short  has  been  and  still  is 
gaining  ground.  As  a  rule,  the  mayor  is  eligible  to  reelec- 
tion when  his  term  has  expired ;  but  in  some  cases  the  city 
charter  precludes  this  reelection,  ast  for  example,  in  Phila- 
delphia. On  the  whole,  ree'lections  are  common :  and  in 
many  cities  that  have  the  two-year  term  there  is  a  well- 
grounded  tradition  that  the  mayor  has  the  right  of  way  to 
renomination  as  the  candidate  of  his  own  political  party 
if  he  so  desires,  a  feeling  which  also  operates  in  his  favor  at 
the  polling. 

In  large  cities,  where,  as  charters  nowadays  arrange  things, 
the  duties  and  powers  of  the  mayor  are  complicated  and 
responsible,  the  two-year  term  is  too  short  to  be  satisfactory 
either  to  the  official  or  to  the  voters.  When  the  two-vear 
term  exists,  a  mayor  commonly  spends  the  first  year  of  hia^ 
tenure  in  feeling  his  way  to  acquaintance  with  the  functions 
of  his  office,  and  the  second  year  in  starting  his  campaign 
for  reelection.  Consequently  the  voters  are  asked  to  give  him 
a  second  term,  not  because  he  has  made  a  good  record,  but 
because  he  has  not  had  a  fair  opportunity  to  make  a  record 
of  any  sort.  The  longer  term  of  four  years,  on  the  con- 
trary, affords  him  ample  time  to  make  and  set  before  the 
voters  a  record  upon  which  they  may  pass  a  fair  judgment. 


1  In  some  other  cities,  notably  in  New  York  State,  the  mayor  may  be 
jgmoved  by  the  governor  of  the  state,  but  only  after  a  public  hearing  at* 
which  causeior  removal  has  been  shown. 


THE   MAYOR  215 

It  is,  moreover,  none  too  long  for  this  purpose,  in  view  of  the 
fact  that  in  American,  as  distinguished  from  European,  cities 
the  mayor  more  often  than  not  brings  no  local  administra- 
tive experience  into  the  office  with  him.  He  must,  therefore, 
avoid  mistakes  by  going  slowly,  learning  as  he  goes..  If  it  be 
urged  that  the  four-year  term  may  mean  a  heavy  penalty 
for  the  city  which  makes  an  unwise  selection,  it  may  now 
be  replied  that  the  recall  procedure,  as  described  in  another 
chapter,  affords  a  practicable  method  of  relief.  The  avail- 
ability of  this  safeguard  has,  indeed,  prompted  several  cities 
to  lengthen  official  terms. 

To  be  eligible  for  election  to  the  mayoralty  of  an  American  Quaiifica- 
city  one  must  in  all  cases  be  a  qualified  voter.  Some 
city  charters  impose  no  additional  qualification.  But  in  San 
Francisco,  Philadelphia,  Baltimore,  and  New  Orleans  jive 
years'  residence  in  the  city  is  exacted,  and  no  one  can  be 
mayor  of  Denver  unless  he  has  been  five  years  a  citizen  of 
the  United  States.  Several  cities  have  a  minimum  age  limit, 
which  varies  from  twenty-five  years  in  Baltimore  and  Phila- 
delphia to  thirty  years  in  New  Orleans.  Verv_few  cities 
still  retain  a  property  qualification;  but  in  Baltimore  a 
property  assessment  of  two  thousand  dollars  is  a  requisite 
to  eligibility,  and  in  Houston,  Texas,  no  one  may  hold  the 
office  of  mayor  unless  he  has  been  for  two  years  the  owner 
of  real  estate  within  the  city  limits.1  No  city  requires  that 
the  mayor  shall  have  professional  qualifications  such  as  are 
commonly  exacted  from  occupants  of  the  corresponding 
office  in  Germany ;  and  nowhere  is  it  necessary  that  he  should, 
have  had  any  prior  administrative  experience. 

As  a  matter  of  practice,  the  men  who  are  elected  to  the  The  type 
office  in  the  smaller  cities  are  usually  drawn  from  those  usually 
who  have  already  served  the  city  in  some  other  official  ca-  choaen- 

1  For  the  qualifications  demanded  in  other  cities,  see  A.  R.  Hatton, 
Digest  of  City  Charters  (Chicago,  1906),  246-248. 


216 


GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Previous 

municipal 

experience 

not 

necessary. 


pacity.  In  the  larger  cities  this  custom  does  not  seem  to  be 
by  any  means  so  common.  Not  that  men  who  have  had  no 
prior  political  experience  are  there  very  often  chosen  as 
mayors ;  only  in  very  exceptional  cases,  indeed,  has  a  man 
been  advanced  directly  from  private  life  to  the  chief  office 
in  a  large  city.  But  the  experience  that  most  of  those  elected 
have  had  is  not  municipal  experience.  Frequently  they 
are  men  who  have  aspired  to  the  office  after  having  had  some 
share  in  state  or  national  politics,  —  men,  for  example,  who 
have  been  in  the  state  legislature  or  in  Congress.  At  times, 
as  in  the  case  of  Mayor  Gaynor  of  New  York  City,  they  have 
served  as  judges  in  the  regular  courts.  At  other  times  they 
have  gained  their  proficiency  in  electioneering,  not  as  candi- 
dates for  any  office,  but  as  active  figures  in  the  regular  party 
organizations  of  the  city  or  the  state.  For  all  this  there 
are,  of  course,  some  good  reasons.  In  a  large  city,  like  New 
York  or  Philadelphia,  the  only  commanding  municipal  post 
is  that  of  mayor.  The  tenure  of  subordinate  city  offices, 
including  membership  in  the  city  council,  does  not  give  the 
occupant  any  secure  place  in  the  political  limelight.  Men 
who  serve  in  such  posts  do  not  easily  command  the  public 
eye  or  ear.  They  can  achieve  this  prominence  better  from 
other  pedestals,  —  from  offices  in  the  nation  or  the  state, 
or  even  in  the  party  organizations.  Furthermore,  one  who 
serves  in  any  subordinate  municipal  office  has  a  record  f  and, 
whether  it  be  good  or  bad,  the  possession  of  a  municipal 
record  is  usually  synonymous  with  the  fact  that  a  man  has 
made  a  good  many  political  and  personal  enemies  in  his  OWIL 
bailiwick.  Such  a  person  has,  therefore,  to  some  extent  im- 
paired his  own  availability  as  a  candidate  for  the  office  of 
mayor  as  compared  with  that  of  one  who  has  had  no  mu- 
nicipal service  and  no  local  record.  It  may  be  suggested  that 
service  in  other  fields,  state  or  national,  also  burdens  the 
candidate  with  a  record.  That  is  true  enough ;  but  the 


THE   MAYOR  217 

record  is  not  so  familiar  to  municipal  voters,  and  in  the  mak- 
ing it  has  probably  not  antagonized  many  interests  among 
them.  Accordingly,  in  the  opinion  of  those  well  fitted  to 
judge,  the  man  who  aspires  to  be  mayor  of  a  large  city  had 
better  not  seek  to  qualify  himself  by  service  in  a  subordinate 
municipal  post.  All  this  seems  to  be  unfortunate,  for  it 
means  that  the  average  mayor  must  acquire  most  of  his 
knowledge  in  local  administrative  matters  after  he  has  been 
inaugurated ;  but  it  is  a  situation  that  too  often  coincides  with 
the  facts,  and,  so  long  as  it  exists,  it  forms  a  good  reason  for 
lengthening  the  mayoral  term  to  four  years. 

In  some  cases,  but  not  very  many,  the  mayoralty  has  The  mayor- 
proved  a  stepping-stone  to  higher  posts  in  the  public  ser-  tralnmg- 
vice.  The  most  noteworthy  instance  is,  of  course,  that  of  j^e^en 
Grover  Cleveland,  who  as  mayor  of  Buffalo  gained  much  of 
the  reputation  for  vigor  and  independence  that  helped  to 
make  him  governor  of  New  York  and,  later,  president  of  the 
United  States.  Theodore  Roosevelt,  who  likewise  attained 
the  presidency  by  way  of  the  governorship,  sought  the  mayor- 
alty of  New  York  City  at  an  early  stage  of  his  political  career, 
but  was  unsuccessful.  These,  however,  are  exceptional 
instances.  How  often  has  a  man  passed  from  the  mayoralty 
of  New  York,  Chicago,  Philadelphia,  or  Boston  to  the  gov- 
ernorship of  the  state  in  which  his  city  is  located  ?  That 
ought  to  be  the  order  of  events ;  but  the  aualj|.ip.s  whjfih 
make  one  a  good  candidate  for  municipal  office  are  not,  as  a 
rule,  the  sort  which  carry  a  man  much  farther  upward. 
Moreover,  the  mayor  who  can  serve  a  full  term  without 
antagonizing  either  his  party  machine  or  the  independent 
element  among  the  voters,  and  can  thereby  retain  his  full 
strength  as  a  candidate  for  higher  office,  is  one  rarely  met 
with  in  our  generation. 

In  all  American  cities  except  the  very  smallest,  and  usually  Salaries  of 

/v  •  t  American 

even  in  these,  the  office  of  mayor  carries  an  annual  salary,  mayors. 


218 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Salaries 
do  not 
usually 
cover  out- 
lay. 


This  may  be  fixed  in  amount  by  a  provision  of  the  charter ; 
or  it  may  be,  and  perhaps  more  commonly  is,  left  to  the  dis- 
cretion of  the  council,  with  the  restriction  that  it  is  not  to 
be  increased  or  diminished  during  the  term  of  a  present  in- 
cumbent. The  amount  of  the  mayor's  salary  varies  roughly 
with  the  size  of  the  city :  New  York  pays  $15,000,  Phila- 
delphia $12,000,  Chicago  and  Boston  $10,000  per  year.1  In 
smaller  cities  the  stipend  ranges  from  the  latter  sum  down 
to  $1000,  or  even  less.  Compared  with  the  remuneration 
of  the  corresponding  office  in  the  cities  of  other  countries, 
these  salaries  give  no  sign  of  municipal  niggardliness.  In  the 
cities  of  England  and  France  the  mayor  receives  no  salary, 
but  only  an  allowance  for  actual  expenses.  In  Germany  the 
burgomasters  are  paid,  and  are  thought  to  be  well  paid,  as 
current  German  salaries  go ;  but,  city  for  city,  they  are 
dealt  with  less  generously  than  their  American  colleagues. 
Still,  it  is  a  fact,  vouched  for  by  most  of  those  who  have  been 
directly  concerned,  that,  even  though  his  stated  remunera- 
tion may  be  fair  enough,  the  American  mayor  takes  his 
office  and  holds  it  at  a  financial  sacrifice.  When  his  term 
comes  to  an  end,  he  usually  finds  himself  poorer  in  all  but 
reputation,  and  sometimes  even  in  that.  All  this,  however, 
is  not  because  the  stipends  are  too  small,  but  because  the 
demands  upon  his  private  purse  are  too  heavy.  Once 
elected,  he  finds  that  the  campaign  from  beginning  to  end  has 
cost  him  a  good  deal.  —  if  not  the  whole  of  at  least  one  year's 
salary,  he  is  accounted  fortunate.  In  some  cities  the  law 
requires  that  candidates  shall  publish  an  accurate  return  of 
their  campaign  expenses ;  and  these  records  give  ample 
evidence  not  only  that  those  who  can  afford  to  spend  money 

1  In  some  cases  the  stipend  is  in  excess  of  that  which  the  governor  of 
the  state  receives.  Thus,  the  mayor  of  New  York  City  gets  $5000  per 
annum  more  than  the  governor  of  New  York,  and  the  mayor  of  Chicago 
$4000  more  than  the  governor  of  Illinois. 


THE   MAYOR  219 

are  expected  to  do  it,  but  also  that  they  often  rise  valiantly 
to  this  expectation.  The  published  returns  of  a  recent  Bos- 
ton election  showed  that  the  two  leading  candidates  ex- 
pended between  them,  from  their  own  pockets  and  for  legiti- 
mate expenses,  sums  amounting  to  about  $150,000,  or  nearly 
two  dollars  for  every  vote  polled.  And  this,  it  may  be  noted, 
did  not  include  contributions  from  supporters  of  their  re- 
spective candidacies. 

Nor  does  the  demand  upon  the  mayor's  pocket  abate  with  Demands 
the  closing  of  the  polls.  He  is  the  subject  of  daily  appeals  m^yoJ's6 
from  every  conceivable  source.  Unless  he  spends  readily,  purae- 
he  soon  acquires  a  reputation  for  close-fistedness  and  is 
rated  as  not  being  a  good  fellow,  all  of  which  is  liable  to  mili- 
tate against  his  chances  of  renomination  and  reelection. 
The  mayor  is  supposed  to  entertain  the  city's  guests  when 
they  comeT  and  although  the  city  budget  usually  provides 
a  fund  for  the  purpose,  this  does  not  always  cover  the  out- 
lav.  It  is  not  that  the  amount  of  each  individual  disburse- 
ment is  important,  but  the  cases  come  so  frequently  that 
the  total  at  the  end  of  the  year  is  likely  to  surprise  any  one 
who  has  not  encountered  the  practice  at  close  range.  Fur- 
thermore, it  frequently  happens  that  the  mayor  is  the  leader 
of  his  local  party  organization.  As  such  he  is  expected  to 
keep  the  machine  running  smoothly.  In  times  which  are 
now  largely  gone  by  he  did  this  by  a  shrewd  use  of  his  power 
to  fill  city  offices  and  to  award  non-competitive  contracts; 
but  the  increased  strictness  of  charter  provisions  relating 
to  the  mayor's  exercise  of  these  prerogatives  has  seriously 
impaired  his  ability  to  serve  the  party  organization  in  these 
directions.  Accordingly,  he  is  nowadays  often  forced  to 
lubricate  the  party  machinery  at  his  own  expense  rather  than 
at  the  cost  of  the  city.  When  everything  is  taken  into  ac- 
count, the  mayor's  salary,  even  if  it  is  fixed  well  up  in  the 
thousands,  can  rarely  be  deemed  anything  more  than  a 


220 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


How 

mayors 
recoup 
themselves. 


'General 
increase  of 


alty  in  influ- 
ence. 


reimbursement  for  expenditures  that  are  expected  of  him 
during  his  election  and  after  it. 

Whatever  may  be  the  theory  of  the  office,  the  actual  fact 
is  that,  in  the  great  majority  of  cases,  the  mayors  give 
their  own  time  to  American  cities  without  direct  personal 
gain.  This  is  not  meant  to  imply  that  mayors  are,  as  a 
rule,  men  of  any  uncommon  altruism.  On  the  contrary, 
they  are,  like  most  other  men,  quite  ready  to  forego  direct 
pecuniary  advantage  from  their  tenure  of  office  so  long  as 
recoupment  comes  to  them,  as  it  often  does,  in  a  roundabout 
way.  If  a  mayor,  for  instance,  is  connected  with  any  form 
of  private  business,  he  necessarily  trails  this  with  him  into 
the  public  gaze.  He  becomes,  as  it  were,  an  effective  press 
agent  in  his  own  interests.  Sometimes,  indeed,  he  serves 
the  credit  side  of  his  private  ledger  in  ways  which,  to  say 
the  least,  show  a  misty  sense  of  official  dignity.  A  mayor 
who,  while  in  office,  continues  his  proprietorship  of  a  weekly 
newspaper  which  draws  its  chief  patronage,  both  in  circu- 
lation and  in  advertising,  from  public-service  corporations, 
municipal  contractors,  and  seekers  for  political  preferment, 
affords  a  good  example  of  at  least  one  way  in  which  office- 
holding  can  be  made  to  yield  an  indirect  profit.  The  actual 
situation  is  thus  unfortunate.  The  right  sort  of  mayor 
must  hold  his  post  almost  always  at  a  financial  sacrifice : 
the  wrong  sort  can  very  easily  make  it  yield  a  profit  which 
is  none  the  less  lucrative  because  it  comes  in  an  indirect 
and  unofficial  way., 

The  remarkable  increase  in  the  powers  of  the  American 
mayor  during  the  last  half-century  has  already  been  pointed 
out.  Before  the  Civil  War  the  mayor  was  the  weaker  of 
the  two  chief  organs  of  municipal  government;  since  that 
era  he  has  almost  everywhere  risen  to  local  mastery.  In 
fact,  the  process  of  strengthening  the  mayoralty  in  relation 
to  the  other  arms  of  city  government  has  had  the  proportions 


THE   MAYOR  221 

of  a  general  movement,  and  few  cities  have  failed  to  feel  its 
influence.  Whether  this  development  has  been  altogether 
salutary  or  only  partly  so  is  a  matter  upon  which  the  doc- 
tors disagree.  At  any  rate,  the  facts  to-day  seem  to  war- 
rant the  assertion  that  in  nearly  all  the  larger  American 
cities  the  mayor  is  the  chief  figure  in  matters  of  municipal 

^"••••••••••^•••••••••••••W*****^  ****• <*M(B^ • * • 

administration,  and  that  in  many  cities  his  direct  influence, 
even  in  the  field  of  what  is  commonly  termed  municipal 
legislation,  is  not  to  be  disregarded.    These  powers,  of  course,  Present- 
vary  in  extent  and  importance  from  city  to  city.     Some 
of  them  are  exercised  in  nearly  every  city,  others  are  preroga-  mayor- 
tives  of  the  office  in  only  a  few.     Speaking  broadly,  however, 
one  may  group  the  powers  of  the  mayor  under  four  heads : 
namely,  the  power  to  recommend  legislation,  the  veto  power, 
powers  connected  with  appointments,  and  powers  connected 
with  appropriations. 

It  has  been  the  theory  of  municipal  organization  in  i.  The 
America  that  the  mayor  ought  to  have  no  share  in  legis- 
lation,  that  is  to  say,  in  the  enactment  of  city  ordinances ;  le«ifllatlon 
but  with  this  theory  the  actual  conditions  have  for  a  long 
time  failed  to  coincide.  It  is  true  that  in  a  few  cities,  notably 
in  Chicago,  the  mayor  is  the  council's  presiding  officer ;  but 
this  is  a  practice  quite  out  of  accord  with  the  general  rule, 
for  in  by  far  the  larger  number  of  American  cities  the  council 
chooses  its  own  presiding  officer,  and  the  mayor  does  not 
take  any  part  in  its  sessions,  or  even  attend  them.  This 
does  not  mean,  however,  that  the  mayor  has  no  influence 
in  shaping  the  council's  actions.  On  the  contrary,  notwith- 
standing the  doctrine  of  separation  of  power,  he  has  com- 
monly more  real  influence  in  municipal  legislation  than  any 
councillor,  or  even  than  several  councillors.  This  direct 
influence  on  local  legislation  arises  from  his  exercise  of  two 
prerogatives,  one  positive  and  the  other  negative,  one  known 
as  the  right  to  suggest  ordinances  by  message,  the  other 


222 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Channels 
through 
which  this 
power  is 
exercised. 


The  mayor's 
messages. 


known  as  the  veto  power.  The  practice  of  addressing  the 
council  by  message  or  communication  has  in  effect  become 
a  right  to  initiate  measures  in  that  body ;  for  a  message  from 
the  mayor  is  invariably  referred  to  the  appropriate  council 
committee  for  report,  and  this  report  puts  the  matter 
squarely  before  the  council  for  action.  Moreover,  among 
the  members  of  the  council  the  mayor  always  has  one  or  more 
political  friends  who  are  known  to  be  in  such  close  touch 
with  him  as  to  be  in  a  sense  his  unofficial  representatives. 
These  councillors  usually  see  that  matters  recommended 
in  the  mayor's  communications  get  such  support  as  they 
can  command ;  hence,  when  the  political  affiliations  of  the_ 
mayor  are  identical  with  those  of_a  majority  of  the  council- 
men,  it  not  infrequently  happens  that  a  recommendation 
from  the  mayor's  office  is  tantamount  to  council  action. 
It  is  to  be  remembered,  moreover,  that,  since  the  mayor  is 
often  the  recognized  leader  of  his  party  organization  in  the 
city,  his  messages  are  understood  to  be  the  orders  of  the 
political  machine  and  are  hence  not  to  be  disregarded 
by  those  councillors  who  desire  reputation  for  party 
regularity. 

The  mayor's  right  to  address  the  council  by  message  or 
communication  is  unrestricted.  Ordinarily  there  is  a  long 
enunciation  of  suggestions  in  his  inaugural  address.  Then 
from  time  to  time  follow  shorter  missives  dealing  with  special 
matters,  and  not  infrequently  accompanied  in  each  case  by 
the  draft  of  an  ordinance  prepared  by  the  city's  law  officers 
at  the  mayor's  request.  This  the  council  is  asked  to  enact 
as  it  stands.  Just  how  far  the  councillors  heed  these  execu- 
tive suggestions  depends  upon  the  caliber  and  personal  in- 
fluence of  the  mayor,  upon  the  make-up  of  the  council,  and 
upon  the  political  relations  between  the  two  authorities. 
When  the  mayor  and  the  council  represent  different  political 
parties,  executive  recommendations  may  count  for  very 


THE  MAYOR  223 

little;  indeed,  the  very  fact  that  the  mayor  favors  a 
project  is  in  such  cases  likely  to  be  regarded  by  the 
majority  of  the  councillors  as  the  best  reason  for  thwart- 
ing it. 

The  negative  influence  of  the  mayor  upon  local  legislation  2.  The  veto 
arising  from  Jiis  possession  of  the  veto  power  can  from  its 
nature  be  indicated  with  greater  definiteness.  Most  city 
charters  make  provision  that  any  ordinance,  resolution,  or 
other  measure  must,  after  it  has  passed  the  council  (or  the 
two  branches  of  the  council,  when  such  exist),  be  sent  to  the 
mayor.  If  the  mayor  approves  it,  he  signs  it ;  whereupon 
the  measure  goes  into  force.  If  he  does  not  approve  the 
proposal,  he  may  return  it  unsigned  to  the  council  within 
a  prescribed  time  (usually  five,  seven,  or  ten  days),  and  in 
returning  it  he  states  his  reasons  for  withholding  his  signa- 
ture. When  there  are  two  chambers,  he  sends  it  to  the  one 
in  which  the  measure  originated.  After  considering  the  The  ma- 
mayor's  reasons,  the  council  takes  a  vote  upon  the  question  the  veto? 
of  sustaining  his  veto.  If  a  prescribed  majority  of  the  coun- 
cillors vote  against  sustaining  it,  the  measure  then  goes  into 
effect  without  the  mayor's  assent.  When  there  are  two 
branches  of  the  council,  the  prescribed  majority  must  be 
obtained  in  each.  ^A.s  a  rule,  the  mayor's  veto  may  be  over- 
ridden by  a  two-thirds  vote  of  one  or  both  councils,  as  the 
case  may  be ;  but  in  some  cities  the  requirement  is  even 
more  rigid.  In  Baltimore,  for  example,  it  is  three-fourths, 
and  in  San  Francisco  it  is  seven-ninths;  a  few  cities, 
notably  Philadelphia,  fix  the  ratio  at  three-fifths.  If  the 
required  majority  cannot  be  had,  the  mayor's  action 
remains  decisive  and  the  council's  project  can  advance  no 
farther. 

In  accordance  with  the  practice  in  vogue  in  the  national  NO  pocket 
and  state  governments,  it  is  usually  provided  that,  if  the  m^mdpai 
mayor  neither  signs  nor  returns  an  ordinance,  resolution,  g°vernment 


224  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

or  other  measure  within  a  certain  period  after  it  has  been 
sent  up  to  him  by  the  council,  the  measure  goes  into  force 
without  his  signature.  But  there  is  in  the  municipal  sys- 
tem no  feature  like  what  is  commonly  known  in  national 
and  state  governments  as  the  "pocket  veto,"-  —  namely, 
the  provision  that  a  measure  becomes  ineffective,  owing  to 
lack  of  executive  assent,  if  the  legislature  closes  its  sessions 
before  the  expiry  of  the  prescribed  period  in  which  this 
assent  may  be  given  or  withheld. 

General  It  will  readily  be  seen  that  in  general  lines  the  executive 

executive  °  ve^°  *s  alike  in  all  three  areas  of  American  government,  na- 
yeto-  tional,  state,  and  municipal.     It  is  a  qualified,  as  distin- 

guished from  an  absolute,  veto  power.  As  such  it  is  a 
distinctively  American  contribution  to  the  science  of  gov- 
ernment. In  no  other  country  does  the  qualified  veto  exist. 
It  is  indigenous  here,  and  to  all  appearances  it  is  likely  to 
remain  an  exclusively  American  political  practice;  for, 
although  during  the  last  century  and  a  quarter  many  things 
have  been  borrowed  from  America  and  woven  into  the  polit- 
ical fabrics  of  other  countries,  the  qualified  veto  is  not  one 
of  them.  Whatever  may  be  the  American  estimate  as  to 
the  worth  of  this  institution,  the  makers  of  political  systems 
abroad  do  not  seem  to  have  been  impressed  with  its  value. 
Even  in  the  United  States  opinions  differ  as  to  the  useful- 
ness of  the  arrangement,  but  not  primarily  as  regards  its 
service  in  the  national  and  state  governments.  The  dif- 
ference of  opinion  rather  takes  the  form  of  a  serious  ques- 
tion whether  the  veto  has,  or  ever  had,  any  proper  place  in 
Genesis  of  the  domain  of  local  government.  The  institution,  it  is  often 
5to'  urged,  found  favor  with  the  framers  of  the  national  and 
state  constitutions  because  they  desired  to  give  the  execu- 
tive a  powerful  weapon  wherewith  to  defend  its  own  field 
of  authority.  Having  in  mind  the  aphorism  of  Alexander 
Hamilton,  that  legislatures  are  wont  to  become  tyrannical, 


THE   MAYOR  225 

they  feared  that,  without  some  such  weapon  as  that  embodied 
in  the  veto  power,  the  appropriate  balance  between  the 
executive  and  legislative  arms  of  the  government  might  be 
disturbed ;  and  to  men  who  believed  implicitly  in  the  teach- 
ings of  Montesquieu,  which  came  by  way  of  Blackstone,  such 
dislocation  spelled  the  subversion  of  popular  liberties.  Now, 
in  their  effort  to  bolster  the  national  and  state  executives 
against  anticipated  onslaughts  in  future  years,  the  fathers 
of  American  government  may  have  acted  wisely  and  well. 
At  any  rate,  these  executives  have  retained  all  their  authority 
unshorn,  and  on  the  whole  they  have  not  brandished  their 
weapon  with  undue  frequency  or  with  vindictiveness.  But 
injbhe  field  of  local  government  no  like  excuse  for  the  execu- 
tive veto  has  ever  existed.  Even  granting  that  the  careful 
apportionment  of  authority  between  executive  and  legisla- 
tive organs  was  ever  here  a  desideratum,  as  it  probably  was 
not,  there  could  have  been  no  reason  to  fear  that  a  disloca- 
tion of  the  balance  would  be  fraught  with  danger  or  would 
lead  to  permanent  misgovernment.  For  above  the  city  and 
its  affairs  stood  the  all-powerful  arm  of  the  state,  with  author- 
ity to  intervene  at  any  moment  in  the  interests  of  readjust- 
ment. Indeed,  if  any  local  organ  ever  had  need  of  a  weapon 
like  the  veto  power  wherewith  to  defend  its  own  sphere  of 
authority,  it  is  certainly  not  the  mayoralty.  It  is,  in  fact 
this  branch  of  city  administration  which,  through  its  steady 
growth  in  strength,  has  made  sorry  work  of  the  original 
balance  of  powers. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  mayor's  veto  power,  has  not,  on  Defects  of 
the  whole,  contributed  very  greatly  to  the  efficiency  of  the 


American  municipal  system.     It  has,  no  doubt,  served  the  mumciPal 

•  n   i»i  '  B         "   govern- 

cause  of  economy  and  sound  administration  in  a  great  many 
instances,  but  it  has  quite  as  often  been  an  effective  instrur 
ment  of  tftlfi  pr*11'*-1'^]  frnlly-  Mayors  have  used  it  in  cases 
without  number  to  bulldoze  and  browbeat  councils  into  sub- 
Q 


226  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

mission.  By  vetoes  and  threats  of  vetoes  councilmen  have 
time  and  again  been  forced  to  choose  between  the  executive 
assassination  of  their  own  measures  and  a  policy  of  sub- 
serviency to  the  mayor  in  other  matters.  Boards  of  alder- 
men have  been  compelled  to  confirm  appointments  made  by 
the  mayor  under  the  threat  that  measures  in  which  alder- 
men and  their  constituents  were  interested  would  be  decapi- 
tated. The  power  has,  in  a  word,  been  used  as  a  mayoral 
asset  that  might  be  traded  for  legislative  compliance.  It 
has  become  an  instrument  of  political  jugglery.  Its  exist- 
ence has  allowed  councils  to  evade  responsibility  for  an  or- 
dinance or  an  appropriation  by  putting  the  burden  upon 
the  shoulders  of  the  mayor,  and  has  allowed  the  mayor  to 
reciprocate  by  tossing  it  back  to  the  council  all  this  polit- 
ical play  serving  no  other  end  than  to  befuddle  the  tax- 
I  payer.  Not  least  among  the  merits  of  the  commission  plan 
of  city  government  is  the  fact  that  it  relegates  the  mayoral 
veto  power  to  the  political  scrap-heap. 

3.  The  A  third  power  of  the  mayor,  and  in  many  cities  his  most 

power!*"18  important  one,  is  that  of  making  appointments  to  the  higher 
places  on  the  city's  pay-roll.  In  most  American  cities,  large 
and  small,  a  few  officers,  notably  those  connected  with  the 
financial  department  of  the  municipality,  are  still  elected 
directly  by  the  people ;  in  some,  a  few  officers  are  still  chosen 
by  the  council.  Here  and  there  a  municipal  officer  is  ap- 
pointed by  the  state,  and  in  a  few  rare  instances  by  the  higher 
state  courts.  Most  appointments  to  higher  municipal  posts 
are,  however,  not  made  in  any  of  these  ways,  but  come  within 
the  appointing  power  of  the  mayor.  Not  that  he  has  an 
entirely  free  hand  in  making  such  appointments ;  ordinarily 
he  nominates,  but  before  becoming  effective  his  nominations 
must  be  confirmed  by  the  board  of  aldermen  or  bv  the  coun- 
cji.  The  genesis  of  this  arrangement  is  of  course  clear: 
it  is  but  another  example  of  the  influence  which  the  federal 


con- 


THE  MAYOR  227 

analogy,  has  exerted  upon  the  structure  and  functions  of 
local  government.  When  it  came  to  be  realized  that  the  The 
work  of  appointing  men  to  municipal  office  was  an  executive 
function,  this  prerogative  was,  logically  enough,  intrusted  ment8- 
to  the  mayor  as  chief  executive  officer  of  the  city  ;  but,  in- 
asmuch as  the  confirmation  of  executive  appointments 
in  the  national  administration  was  given  to  the  upper 
house  of  the  national  legislature,  it  seemed  fitting  that  in 
those  cities  which  had  a  bicameral  system  the  confirming 
power  should  be  allotted  to  the  smaller  of  the  two  council 
bodies,  commonly  called  the  board  of  aldermen.  Twenty- 
five  or  thirty  years  ago  this  was  the  almost  invariable  prac- 
tice in  American  cities,  large  and  small;  and  it  is  still  in 
vogue  in  most  of  the  medium-sized  and  smaller  cities. 
Within  the  last  decade,  however,  the  practice  of  requiring 
conciliar  confirmation  of  mayor's  appointments  has  been 
losing  ground  very  rapidly. 

It  used  to  be  thought  that  the  system  of  having  the  mayor's  Reputed 
appointments  confirmed  by  the  board  of  aldermen  (or,  in 
those  cities  which  have  a  single  chamber,  by  the  council) 

confirma- 

had  much  in  its  favor.     The  policy  seemed  to  be  in  keeping  tion. 
with  the  scheme  of  American  government  in  state  and  na- 
tion;  it  was  thought  to  afford  a  salutary  check  upon  pos- 
sible abuses  of  the  mayor's  discretionary  powers  ;    and  it 
was  commonly  justified  on  the  ground  that  "it  placed  no 
handicap  upon  a  good  mayor  and  set  obstacles  in  the  way 
of  a  bad  one."     People  nowadays,  however,  have  come  to  be 
much  more  sceptical  concerning  these  alleged  merits.     Tt  l^aa 
been  found  that,  more  often  than  not,  the  system  of  alder- 
manic   confirmation  has   afforded   a   most  convenient  ar- 
rangement for   evading  responsibility.     Mayors  have  not  its  abuses 
hesitated  to  wash  their  hands  of  all  accountability  for  ap-  aldermen. 
pointing  professional  politicians  to  municipal  office,  by  the 
plausible  and  frequently  accurate  assertion  that  the  aldermen 


228  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

would  not  confirm  any  others  than  party  spoilsmen.  More 
than  once  the  system  has  enabled  the  aldermen  to  give  the 
mayor  the  unpalatable  alternative  either  of  rewarding  hench- 
men by  places  on  the  city's  pay-roll,  or  of  having  posts  left 
vacant  over  periods  so  long  as  to  impede  the  administration 
of  the  city's  affairs.  In  those  cities  where  aldefmen  are 
elected  by  wards,  and  where,  in  consequence,  petty  prejudices 
come  into  full  play,  the  system  has  achieved  its  worst.  It 
has  frequently  become  an  effective  instrument  of  political 
blackmail,  forcing  the  mayor  to  countenance  extravagant 
appropriations,  pilfering  contracts,  or  high-handed  ordi- 
nances on  pain  of  having  his  appointments  rejected.  As 
the  experience  of  the  past  quarter-century  abundantly  shows, 
the  practice  of  aldermanic  confirmation  has  proved  to  be  no 
effective  barrier  against  the  appointment  of  incompetents  to 
municipal  office;  its  chief  service  has  been  in  providing  a 
means  of  bewildering  voters  when  they  try  to  hold  any  one 
accountable  for  official  incompetency  or  misdemeanor. 
its  abuse  It  would  be  unfair,  however,  to  convey  the  idea  that  only 

mayor.  the  confirming  authorities  have  been  remiss.  Mayors, 
under  the  system  of  aldermanic  confirmation,  have  too  fre- 
quently been  ready  to  play  politics.  They  have  been 
known  to  send  forward  names  of  well-qualified  men  who,  as 
they  had  already  ascertained,  were  sure  to  fail  of  confirma- 
tion,—  a,  ruse  intended  to  mislead  the  more  exacting  ele- 
ment in  the  community,  and  thereby  to  afford  a  plausible 
excuse  for  the  nomination  of  some  political  or  personal 
favorite  a  few  days  later.  If  aldermen  have  used  their  pre- 
rogative of  confirmation  to  force  the  mayors*  hands,  the 
mayors  have  been  just  about  as  ready  to  trundle  their  own 
political  interests  by  foisting  upon  the  aldermen  respon- 
sibility for  anything  that  is  likely  to  evoke  antagonism  from 
some  faction  of  the  voters.  In  fact,  this  provision  of  the 
old  municipal  system  has  probably  been  responsible  for  more 


THE   MAYOR  229 

scurvy  deals  between  the  executive  and  legislative  branches 
of  American  city  governments  than  any  other  feature. 

And  what  has  been  said  of  aldermanip.  confirmation  in  The  system 
appointments  applies  equally  to  the  practice  of  requiring  maSTon- 
aldermanic  concurrence  in  removals  from  office.  Mayors  currencem 

«««nBB«*»«"»«»««>Mc»««B""«"e»«—"™""»«"«"««»^^  removals. 

are  commonly  charged  with  the  duty  of  supervising  the 
work  of  the  various  city  departments.  The  efficiency 
of  these  departments  of  course  depends  largely  upon  the 
capacity  of  the  officer  immediately  in  charge;  but  if  the 
mayor  is  not  allowed  to  exercise  a  free  hand  in  removing 
the  head  of  a  municipal  department  in  whose  capacity  he 
has  no  confidence,  it  is  difficulff  fo  ^  how  hf>  r>a.n  he  held 
accountable  for  departmental  short  comings.  In  those 
cities  where  the  mayor  cannot  without  concurrence  remove 
a  single  patrolman,  even  for  gross  misconduct  or  misde- 
meanor, it  requires  no  intuitive  political  sagacity  to  under- 
stand how  police  discipline  becomes  demoralized,  or  why 
patrolmen  often  put  more  faith  in  the  influence  of  an  alder- 
man than  in  their  own  records  for  good  conduct  and  effi- 
ciency. In  all  recent  charters  the  confirmation  and  con-^  _ 
currence  clauses  have  disappeared.  They  may  well  be 
relegated  to  a  place  among  the  discards  of  political  science ; 
for  not  only  have  they  rendered  the  cause  of  efficient  munici- 
pal administration  no  permanent  service  of  any  importance, 
but  they  have  often  been  actually  pernicious  in  operation. 

Cities  that  have  adopted  the  commission  type  of  govern-  Mayoral 
ment  vest  the  power  of  appointment  in  the  commission  as  J^^ti*. 
a  whole,  not  in  the  mayor :   but  those  which  have  revised  °ut  c°n- 

firmation. 

their  charters  without  adopting  the  commission  plan  leave 
it  still  with  the  chief  executive.  In  some  of  these  places 
he  exercises  the  right  to  appoint  all  heads  of  municipal 
departments  and  all  members  of  city  boards  or  com- 
missions without  the  sanction  of  the  municipal  council  or 
of  any  other  body.  New  York  affords  the  best  example 


230  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

of  this  system.  By  her  charter  of  1898,  as  amended  in 
1901,  the  power  and  responsibility  were  concentrated  in  the 
mayor,  who  was  thereby  invested  with  a  discretionary  au- 
thority more  extensive  than  that  possessed  by  the  chief 
The  Boston  executive  officer  of  any  other  city  whether  in  America  or 
elsewhere.  In  Boston,  by  the  charter  changes  of  1909,  the 
duty  of  passing  upon  the  mayor's  appointments  was  taken 
from  the  board  of  aldermen  and  given  to  the  state  civil- 
service  commission.  In  general  the  new  charter  provisions 
commit  to  the  mayor  the  right  to  nominate  all  heads  of  de- 
partments and  all  members  of  city  commissions,  whether 
paid  or  unpaid,  the  only  important  exceptions  being  a  few 
officials  and  commissioners  who  are  either  chosen  by  the 
council  or  appointed  by  the  governor  of  the  state,  and  the 
school  committee,  which  is  directly  elected  by  the  voters 
of  the  city.  It  is  provided  that,  when  the  mayor  makes 
any  such  nomination  to  office,  he  shall  file  a  certificate  with 
the  city  clerk,  who  shall  transmit  a  copy  to  the  civil-ser- 
vice commission,  which  is  a  state  board  made  up  of  three 
members,  each  appointed  by  the  governor  for  a  three-year 
term.  In  making  the  nomination  the  mayor  is  required  to 
certify  that  the  person  nominated  is  "a  recognized  expert 
in  the  work  which  will  devolve  upon  him/'  or  aa  person 
/  /  specially  fitted  by  education,  training,  or  experience  to  per- 
form the  duties"  of  the  office.  Upon  receipt  of  the  nomina- 
tion the  civil-service  commission  proceeds  to  make  a  careful 
inquiry  into  the  qualifications  of  the  nominee.  If  a  majority 
of  the  members  of  the  commission  decide  that  the  person 
named  by  the  mayor  is  possessed  of  the  designated  quali- 
fications, this  decision  is  communicated  to  the  city  clerk 
and  the  appointment  goes  into  effect.1  If  the  commission 
is  not  satisfied,  it  merely  remains  silent;  and,  by  the 
provisions  of  the  charter,  on  the  expiry  of  thirty  days  the 
1  Acts  and  Resolves  of  Massachusetts,  1909,  oh.  486. 


THE  MAYOR  231 

mayor's  designation  lapses.    He  may  then  submit  another 
name. 

The  Boston  plan  rests  upon  the  conviction  that  alder-  Rational 

,,  ,.  vi  .i_  •  basiaoftho 

manic  confirmation  as  a  check  upon  the  mayor  is  an  open  Boston 
farce,  if  nothing  worse ;  that  the  average  mayor  cannot  be  8yatem- 
safely  trusted  to  appoint  competent  heads  of  departments 
if  he  has  sole  responsibility  in  the  matter;  and  that  the 
system  of  competitive  civil-service  examinations  does  not 
procure,  for  department  headships,  men  of  adequate  ad- 
ministrative capacity  or  political  vision.  It  gives  the  mayor 
entire  freedom  of  appointment  so  long  as  he  keeps  within 
the  ranks  of  those  who  have  some  qualification  for  the  work 
which  they  are  expected  to  perform ;  but  it  provides  a  means, 
whereby  his  freedom  of  action  may  be  promptly  curtailed, 
whenever  he  steps  outside  these  bounds  and  attempts  to  pay 
political  debts  from  the  city's  salary  account^  During  the 
first  twelve  months  after  the  new  Boston  charter  went  into 
operation  the  mayor  sent  to  the  civil-service  commission 
the  names  of  seventy-one  persons,  all  of  whom  were  certified 
as  "  recognized  experts,"  or  as  persons  qualified  "  by  education,  its  actual 
training,  or  experience"  for  the  work  which  they  were  desig- 
nated to  do.  The  commission  found  that  even  under  the 
broadest  interpretation  of  the  terms  only  fifty  could  be 
confirmed  as  meeting  the  charter  requirements.1  Of  the 
others,  many  were  recognized  experts  in  nothing  but  poli- 
tics. In  one  case  the  mayor  sent  forward,  for  appointment 
to  the  office  of  fire  commissioner,  the  name  of  a  man  whose 
qualifications  "by  education,  training,  or  experience"  rested 
mainly  on  the  fact  that  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago  he  had  served 
as  a  member  of  a  volunteer  bucket  brigade.  In  other  cases 

1  Of  the  seventy-one  nominations,  forty  were  to  paid  positions  and 
thirty-one  to  unpaid.  Of  the  twenty-one  nominations  which  the 
commission  declined  to  approve,  fifteen  were  to  paid  and  six  to  unpaid 
positions. 


232 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


he  relapsed  to  the  evils  of  the  old  system  of  aldennanic 
confirmation  by  presenting,  in  an  apparent  endeavor  to 
make  political  capital,  the  names  of  men  who,  as  he  must 
have  known,  could  not  under  any  circumstances  be  certified 
as  competent. 

itssatisfac-  In  Massachusetts,  where  officers  appointed  by  the  state 
authorities  can  usually  be  relied  upon  to  display  the  neces- 
sary integrity  and  independence,  the  Boston  plan  has  its 
advantages.  That  it  has  secured -for  the  city  a  better  set 
of  department  heads  than  could  be  hoped  for  under  the  old 
regime  is  beyond  serious  question.1  That  it  is  thoroughly 
unpopular  with  machine  politicians  is  equally  certain  and 
by  no  means  surprising.  But  it  may  well  be  doubted 
whether  the  system  would  insure  any  marked  improvement 
in  the  cities  of  those  states  which  cannot  be  relied  upon  to 
provide  civil-service  commissions  with  the  necessary  aloof- 
ness from  political  chicanery.  A  plan  that  serves  Boston 
well  might  very  conceivably  prove  a  failure  in  Chicago  or 
Philadelphia. 

4.  The  A   fourth   administrative   function  which   fa   frpqi1PTI*Vi 

initiate*0       though  not  in  the  majority  of  American  cities,  intrusted 
appropria-     to  the  mayor  is  that  of  supervising  the  preparation  of  the 

tions.  «•••••• ••-«—•*•— •—•-i  i    m  M  i        -i 

municipal  budget.  There  was  a  time  when  this  task  was 
performed  by  the  city  council  through  one  of  its  committees 
commonly  called  the  finance  committee.  That  is  the  plan  still 
followed  in  English  cities,  but  it  has  never  worked  very  well 
in  America.  Here  members  of  the  council  manoeuvred  for 
positions  on  the  finance  committee  in  order  to  wedge  into 
the  budget  the  appropriations  in  which  they  were  person- 

1  "Attempts  on  the  part  of  the  mayor  to  circumvent  or  override  these 
[civil-service]  amendments  have  been  repeated  and  persistent,  but  they 
have  been  generally  unsuccessful,  and  this  feature  of  the  charter  has  not 
merely  been  justified  but  has  shown  itself  an  indispensable  bulwark  against 
unfit  appointments."  —  BOSTON  FINANCE  COMMISSION,  Reports,  VI.  16 
(1911). 


THE  MAYOR  233 

ally  interested.  The  size  of  the  various  items  in  the  list  thus 
reduced  itself  to  a  question  of  comparative  efficiency  in  log- 
rolling on  the  part  of  councillors,  and  the  city  treasury  bore 
the  brunt  of  it  all.  Thus  it  came  about  that  the  initiative  in 
regard  to  the  budget  was  often  taken  away  from  the  council 
altogether.  In  New  York  the  work  of  preparing  the  budget,  The  New 
jand  thereby  determining  the  annual  tax-rate,  is  now  vested  tem.  8y8~ 
in  a  body  known  as  the  Board  of  Estimate  and  Apportion- 
jment,  composed  of  the  mayor,  the  comptroller,  the  president 
f  the  board  of  aldermen,  and  the  five  borough  presidents, 
f After  the  budget  has  been  finally  adopted  by  this  board  it 
goes  to  the  aldermen ;  but  the  latter  can  make  no  changes 
in  it  except  by  way  of  reduction,  and  even  in  this  respect 
their  action  is  subject  to  veto  by  the  mayor,  whose  decision 
can  in  such  cases  be  overridden  only  by  a  three-fourths  vote. 
In  Boston  the  budget  is  drafted  by  the  mayor  alone.  No  The  Boston 
proposal  to  spend  the  city's  money  can  be  considered  by  the  p  ai 
council  unless  it  emanates  from  the  mayor.  The  council 
may  reduce  or  omit  any  item,  but  it  may  not  make  any  in- 
sertions or  increases.  Under  this  system  the  undivided 
responsibility  for  all  municipal  expenditures  falls  upon  the 
mayor.  Unfortunately,  however,  this  does  not  make 
him  directly  accountable  to  the  electorate  for  increases 
in  the  annual  tax-rate  of  the  city ;  for  this  rate  depends  not 
only  upon  the  amount  of  expenditures  directly  under  the 
mayor's  control,  but  also  upon  the  amounts  levied  by  vari- 
ous commissions  which  are  appointed  by  the  state  to  per- 
form certain  semi-municipal  functions  in  and  about  the  city, 
and  are  authorized  to  assess  on  Boston  either  the  whole  cost 
or  a  large  proportion  of  it.  It  is  easy  enough  to  propound 
the  doctrine  that  complete  and  undivided  responsibility  for 
the  amount  of  the  annual  tax-rate  should  be  centred  in  the 
mayor;  but  so  long  as  important  obligations  are  continu- 
ally saddled  upon  the  city  by  some  outside  superior  author- 


234 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


ity  this  centralization  of  responsibility  is  not  so  easy  to 
secure. 

6.  Mined-  In  addition  to  the  foregoing  powers,  —  those  relating  to 
mino"8  ""*  legislation,  to  the  veto,  to  appointments,  and  to  finances,  — 
powers.  the  American  mayor  has  powers  and  duties  of  a  rather  mis- 
cellaneous sort.  In  most  cities  he  is  intrusted  with  a  gen- 
eral supervision  over  the  various  municipal  departments  ; 
but  this  in  itself  gives  him  no  authority  of  consequence.  If 
the  mayor  has  power  to  appoint  and  remove  the  depart- 
mental heads,  from  the  very  nature  of  things  he  needs  no 
specific  grant  of  supervisory  authority  over  what  they  do; 
and  if  he  has  not  the  power  to  appoint  and  remove,  a  formal 
supervisory  jurisdiction  is  of  little  use  to  him.  By  pro- 
vision of  the  city  charter,  the  mayor  is  often  authorized  to 
receive  reports  from  the  administrative  departments  at 
stated  intervals  or  when  he  calls  for  them.  In  some  cities 
he  has  the  right  to  inspect  the  accounts  of  city  officers,  or 
to  conduct  investigations  into  the  working  of  any  branch  of 
the  administration.  In  a  few  cities  he  may,  when  necessary, 
call  out  the  militia  to  aid  the  local  police  ;  and  in  a  number 
of  places  he  may  pardon  offenders  who  have  been  convicted 
in  the  municipal  courts,  and  may  remit  fines  imposed  there. 

i  Besides  all  this,  the  mayor  is  the  official  representative  of 
the  city  in  all  dealings  with  other  municipalities  or  with 
the  state.  In  person  or  through  some  one  delegated  by 
him  he  represents  the  city  at  legislative  hearings  and  other 
official  conferences  at  which  the  city's  attitude  is  presented. 
Considerable  demands  are  also  made  upon  both  his  purse 
and  his  patience,  if  he  undertakes  to  do  a  tithe  of  what  is 
expected  of  him  as  the  representative  of  the  municipality 
at  numberless  semi-official  and  private  gatherings  or  func- 
tions. The  mayor  of  an  American  city,  whether  large  or 
small,  need  never  be  idle. 

That  the  powers  and  duties  which  ordinarily  attach  to  the 


THE  MAYOR  235 

office  of  mayor  have  greatly  increased  during  the  last  forty  The  steady 
or  fifty  years  has  already  been  mentioned.     In  national  gov-  mayorai° 
ernment  the  adjustment  of  executive  and  legislative  powers,  P°wera- 
as  originally  established,  has  never  been  seriously  disturbed. 
The  national  executive  may  have  increased  its  powers  some- 
what during  the  last  one  hundred  and  twenty  years,  but  not 
to  any  notable  degree.     So,  also,  with  the  balance  of  power 
in  state  government :  governors  to-day  take  about  the  same 
role  in  state  administration  that  they  took  a  century  since. 
But  in  the  realm  of  municipal  government  the  shifting  of 
power  has   been  very  marked   indeed.     From  his  original 
place  as  a  dependent  and  subordinate  of  the  municipal 
legislature,  the  mayor  has  risen  steadily  to  a  plane  on  which 
he  is  at  least  coordinate  with  the  council^  and  very  often, 
superior  to  it,  in  scope  of  power  and  influence.    This  means, 
of  course,  that  the  powers  of  the  municipal  legislature  have 
been  correspondingly  impaired. 

Whether  this  development  has  served  on  the  whole  to  Has  this 
increase  the  efficiency  of  municipal  administration,  or 
whether,  as  some  claim,  it  represents  a  half-century  of  grop- 
ing  along  the  wrong  path,  is  a  question  too  involved  and  per- 
haps too  controversial  to  have  much  discussion  in  a  general 
survey.  It  is  safe  to  say,  however,  that  the  policy  of  taking 
power  from  the  other  organs  of  city  government  and  loading 
it  upon  the  mayor  has  not  served  to  secure  a  degree  of  effi- 
ciency or  economy  that  is  at  all  satisfactory  to  the  people 
who  pay  the  bills.  The  mayors  of  American  cities  like  New 
York  or  Boston  have  more  statutory  power  than  the  burgo- 
master of  Berlin  or  the  Parisian  prefects.  Hence,  if  the 
former  cities  represent  failures  in  the  American  scheme 
of  popular  government,  it  is  not  through  any  lack  of  power 
on  the  part  of  the  city  executive. 


236  GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 


REFERENCES 

On  the  development  of  executive  jurisdiction  in  American  cities  the 
general  references  indicated  at  the  close  of  Chapter  I  contain  a  good  deal 
of  information.  Particular  mention  should,  however,  be  made  of  J.  A. 
Fairlie's  chapter  on  "  Municipal  Development  in  the  United  States,"  in 
his  Municipal  Administration  (New  York,  1901).  Many  details  relating 
to  the  term,  salary,  position,  and  powers  of  the  mayor  in  various  larger 
cities,  both  in  America  and  Europe,  are  given  in  A.  R.  Hatton's  Digest 
of  City  Charters  (Chicago,  1906),  especially  pp.  246-272;  but  changes 
have  been  very  numerous  throughout  the  country  since  the  publication  of 
this  volume.  Useful  general  discussions  may  be  found  in  F.  J.  Goodnow's 
Municipal  Government  (New  York,  1909),  oh.  xi. ;  D.  F.  Wilcox's  Ameri- 
can City  (New  York,  1904) ,  ch.  x. ;  D.  B.  Eaton's  Government  of  Munici- 
palities (New  York,  1899),  ch.  xiv. ;  and  in  the  Municipal  Program  (New 
York,  1900),  74-87.  Short  articles  of  more  than  ordinary  interest  are 
E.  A.  Greenlaw's  "  Office  of  Mayor  in  the  United  States,"  in  Municipal 
Affairs,  III.  33-60,  and  E.  D.  Durand's  "Council  Government  versus 
Mayor  Government,"  in  Political  Science  Quarterly,  XV.  426-451, 675-709. 
The  Reports  of  the  Boston  Finance  Commission  (7  vols.,  Boston,  1908- 
1912),  especially  vol.  II.,  pp.  211-230,  contain  facts  and  figures  relating  to 
the  actual  administration  of  a  mayor's  office  under  a  partisan  regime. 


THE   ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS 

THE  administrative  department  as  a  self-standing  factor 
in  city  government,  independent  of  the  municipal  council, 
not  chosen  by  the  latter,  and  not  made  up  of  members  from 

....  ment. 

it,  is  also  an  exclusively  American  institution.  Like  many 
other  features  in  the  American  system  of  urban  government, 
it  is  a  by-product  of  that  undue  stress  which  was,  during 
the  nineteenth  century,  laid  upon  the  principle  of  division 
of  powers  in  local,  as  in  state  a.nH  im.t.inTifl.1.  fl.ffa.ira~  It 
has  been  shown  in  a  previous  chapter  that,  during  the 
colonial  era  and  for  an  interval  after  the  Revolution,  legis- 
lative and  administrative  functions  were  not  divorced  in 
the  cities  of  this  country.  The  city  council  had  charge  of 
both ;  and  throughout  the  first  four  or  five  decades  of  the 
nineteenth  century  the  various  tasks  of  local  administration, 
as  they  confronted  the  cities,  were  given  over  to  standing 
committees  of  the  council.  That  was  the  plan  pursued  in 
England,  whence  the  cities  of  the  United  States  first  derived 
their  frame  of  government,  and  it  remains  unaltered  in 
English  municipalities  to  the  present  day.1 

A  system  of  administering  the  various  branches  of  a  city's 
business  (such  as  police,  fire  protection,  public  works,  schools,  of  a 
and  so  on)  through  the  direct  agency  of  standing  council  -fr^fl  by 

COUDC1T^ 

committees  has  on  general  principles  much  to  commend  it.  committees 
In  the  first  place,  there  is  not  enough  purely  legislative  work 
to  keep  a  council  employed.     In  the  United  States  the  activ- 

1  The  way  in  which  this  plan  of  department  administration  by  council 
committees  works  in  the  cities  of  Great  Britain  is  explained  in  Munro's 
Government  of  European  Cities  (New  York,  1909),  282-294. 

237 


238 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


ity  of  the  state  legislatures  is  so  great  and  constant  that 
very  little  in  the  way  of  law-making,  or  anything  closely 
akin  to  it,  is  left  for  subordinate  authorities.  Fny  t.hft  lar^r 
American  cities,  at  any  rate,  the  real  law-making  authority 
is  the  state  legislature.  The  few  ordinances  left  for  the 
city  to  pass  engage  the  attention  of  the  average  municipal 
council  hardly  a  tithe  of  its  time.  Hence  it  is  that,  when 
councils  are  by  the  terms  of  the  city  charter  reduced  to  the 
plane  of  ordinance-making  bodies,  they  sink  to  positions  of 
little  importance  in  the  general  scheme  of  municipal  govern- 
ment and  fail  to  attract  to  their  membership  men  of  any 
ambition  or  capacity. 

A   citv  council,   moreover,   does  nnt,  usually  fl.nr.pnt,  this 


ouster  from  administrative  influence  with  good  grace.  Its 
members  are  commonly  elected  from  the  various  wards  of  the 
city ;  indeed,  the  only  representative  which  a  certain  ward 
or  district  may  have  in  the  whole  city  government  is  not  in- 
frequently a  member  of  the  city  council.  When  the  ward 
wants  something  from  an  administrative  department,  it  looks 
to  its  own  representative  to  secure  it.  Through  sheer  pres- 
sure brought  upon  them  by  the  neighborhoods  from  which 
they  come,  therefore,  and  despite  charter  provisions  to  the 
contrary,  the  councillors  are  forced  into  attempts  to  exert 
an  influence  and  control  over  matters  of  administration. 
Diversities  of  local  interests  are  relative  to  administration 
rather  than  to  legislation.  It  is  not  that  any  part  of  the  city 
fears  that  it  will  fail  to  receive  its  due  share  of  attention  in 
the  ordinances;  it  is  rather  that  each  ward  or  district 
jealously  desires  its  full  portion  of  what  is  to  be  spent  for  pub- 
lic works,  or  police,  or  fire  protection,  or  parks,  playgrounds, 
and  so  on.  If  the  various  parts  of  the  city  are  represented 
in  only  one  branch  of  the  city  government,  this  body  is  ex- 
pected to  transmit  local  demands  to  those  branches  in  which 
localities  as  such  are  not  represented.  Hence  it  has  almost 


THE  ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS  239 

always  happened  that  a  city  council  which  has  been  de- 
prived by  law  of  all  direct  share  in  administrative  work  will 
nevertheless  strive  to  exert  a  control  in  roundabout  ways, 
some  of  which  have  already  been  described.1  In  any  case, 
friction  between  legislative  and  administrative  organs  is  al- 
most certain  to  be  the  outcome ;  and  when  there  is  a  clash  be- 
tween an  elective  body,  such  as  the  council,  and  an  appointive 
authority,  such  as  the  headship  of  an  administrative  depart- 
ment must  be  if  it  is  to  be  efficient,  popular  sympathy  is 
altogether  likely  to  be  with  the  former,  despite  any  charter 
provision  which  relegates  the  elective  body  to  a  place  outside  3.  Embod- 
the  realm  of  administration.  The  principle  was  well  stated  * 


princile 

by  Lord  Durham  in  his  famous  report  upon  the  government 
of  colonies,  but  it  holds  with  equal  soundness  in  all  spheres 
of  representative  government.  It  is  idle  to  expect,  he  de- 
clared, that  a  body  of  elected  representatives  will  suffer  it- 
self to  be  relegated  by  any  theory  of  government  to  a  position 
of  administrative  impotence,  while  men  who  do  not  owe  their 
places  to  popular  election  control  all  the  direct  avenues 
through  which  the  people's  money  is  spent.2 

Now,  as  a  matter  of  principle,  the  logical  carrying  out  of  The  admin- 
the  policy  which  some  reformers  would  have  all  American 
cities  pursue,  —  that  is  to  say,  the  complete  elimination  of  the 


council  from  all  part  in  administrative  affairs  (this  includes  the  suprem- 

acy of 
the  appointment  of  officials  and  the  actual  spending  of  all  popular 

moneys),  and  the  intrusting  of  these  affairs  to  heads  of  tives. 
departments  not  elected  by  the  people  but  chosen  by  some 
sort  of  competitive  civil-service  test,  —  the  logical  outcome 
of  this  policy  would  be  the  establishment  of  a  natural  an- 
tagonism between  the  elective  and  non-elective  branches  of 
government,  an  arrangement  which,  as  Lord  Durham  pointed 
out,  cannot  permanently  endure  in  any  representative  system. 

1  Above,  pp.  204-205. 

2  Report  on  the  Affairs  of  British  North  America  (London,  1839). 


240  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

The  idea  that  one  organ  of  city  government,  popularly  elected 
and  intended  to  be  a  mirror  of  public  opinion,  will  content 
itself  with  a  mere  share  in  the  making  of  local  ordinances 
while  the  real  business  of  the  city  is  carried  on  by  heads  of 
departments  who  neither  directly  nor  indirectly  owe  their 
appointment  to  popular  choice,  —  such  an  idea  is  a  delu- 
sion that  experience  ought  long  since  to  have  shattered. 
steps  by  But  when  administrative  duties  were  first  taken  away  from 

the  council  the    were  not  given  to  boards  or  officials  selected 


-       *n  *^s  wav>     The  change  was  not  dictated  by  a  conviction 


tive  depart-   that  administration  should  be  put  in  charge  of  experts  chosen 

ment  has  _. 

been  devel-  by  open  competition.  It  was  due  rather  to  the  feeling  that 
the  various  branches  of  the  city's  business  could  be  managed 
better  by  boards  or  officials  directly  elected  than  by  commit- 
tees of  the  council  which  were  liable  to  be  chosen  by  log- 
rolling methods.  Accordingly,  independent  administrative 
officials  and  boards  were  for  a  time  elected  by  popular  vote. 
It  was  soon  found,  however,  that  the  system  of  popular 
election  did  not  serve  the  cause  of  efficiency.  The  next  step. 
therefore,  was  to  transfer  the  responsibility  of  selection  frorn^ 
the  voters  to  the  mayor,  a  change,  it  was  argued,  that  did 
not  remove  administration  from  popular  control,  inasmuch  as 
the  mayor  who  appointed  and  might  at  any  time  dismiss  these 
boards  and  officials  was  himself  an  elected  officer,  responsible 
to  the  voters.  But  even  this  transfer  did  not  secure  the 
efficient  direction  of  city  departments  ;  for  in  mosfr  cases 
the  mayor,  using  his  appointive  power  as  an  agency  of  po^ 
litical  patronage,  put  them  in  charge  of  men  whose  only^ 
qualification  was  consistent  party  service.  By  these  steps 
the  quest  for  some  arrangement  that  will  insure  a  certain 
degree  of  administrative  competence  in  the  heads  of  city  de- 
partments has  proceeded  to  the  scheme  of  selecting  them 
under  civil-service  supervision. 

The  most  promising  plan  of  this  sort  yet  put  into  operation 


THE  ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS  241 

is  that  adopted  in  Boston  by  the  charter  ai^eriHTnp.nt.g  of  1 9f)9.  The  seiec- 
By  the  terms  of  this  legislation  heads  of  departments  and  partment 
members  of  boards  in  charge  of  departments  are  appointed  heada- 
by  the  mayor ;  but  these  appointments  do  not  go  into  effect 
until  approved  by  the  civil-service  commission,  which  is,  as 
has  already  been  stated,  a  board  of  three  members  appointed 
by  the  governor  of  Massachusetts.  The  initiative  in  appoint- 
ments rests  wholly  with  the  mayor.  He  may  select  whom  he  The  Boston 
will,  provided  the  civil-service  commission  assents ;  and  it  is  p  "** 
required  by  law  to  do  so  if  it  finds  that  the  mayor's  nominee 
is  qualified  for  the  post  by  training  or  by  experience.  There 
is  no  competitive  test  of  any  sort ;  it  is  not  necessary  that 
the  mayor's  nominee  be  the  best  man  available,  but  only  that 
he  offer  reasonable  promise  of  competency.  During  the 
last  few  years  this  system  has  worked  well,  though  it  has 
proved  more  successful  in  protecting  the  city  against  political 
appointments  than  in  securing  experts  as  heads  of  depart- 
ments. It  seems  to  guarantee  that  the  men  put  in  charge 
of  departments  shall  frp  «.*.  ^^  tolerably  competent,  but 
in  the  hands  of  a  mayor  who  is  not  in  sympathy  with  the 
system  i^^oes  nn|,  assure  the  city  much  more  than  that.  On 
the  other  hand,  it  preserves  the  forms  of  responsible  appoint- 
ment ;  for  the  actual  selection  of  administrative  heads  is  its  chief 
made  by  the  mayor,  who  is,  in  turn,  elected  by  the  people. 
This  is  a  matter  of  more  than  formal  importance  in  deter- 
mining the  relations  of  these  men,  when  installed  in  office, 
both  with  the  mayor  and  with  the  city  council.  The  mayor 
cannot  disclaim  responsibility  for  their  success  or  failure, 
since  by  sending  their  names  to  the  civil-service  commis- 
sion for  confirmation  he  must  expressly  vo^o.h  for  their 
competence. 

Many  other  cities  of  the  United  States  have  put  most  of  ita  basic 
their  officials  into  some  sort  of  contact  with  civil-service  p 
machinery,  but  as  yet  Boston  is  the  only  one  'to  do  this  in 


242  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

case  of  the  actual  heads  of  city  departments.1  And  it 
cannot  be  made  too  clear  that  the  Boston  system  is  not 
competitive.  Those  who  devised  the  plan  were  thoroughly 
in  sympathy  with  the  policy  of  filling  all  subordinate  posts  in 
the  municipal  service  by  competitive  merit  tests,  but  they 
were  not  ready  to  adopt  this  method  of  selecting  depart- 
ment heads,  who  have  the  power  to  determine  policies.  This 
distinction  between  officials  whose  tasks  involve  discretion 
in  the  determination  of  departmental  policy  and  those  whose 
duties  are  of  a  non-discretionary  character  seems  to  be  sound 
The  place  of  in  principle.  Experts  are  needed,  and  very  sorely  needed, 
dty*admia-n  in  the  administrative  services  of  American  cities,  and  the 
iatration.  best  practicable  means  of  securing  them  is  by  open  competir 
tion  ;  but  it  does  not  follow  that  the  place  for  the  expert  is  at 
the  head  of  the  department.  The  city's  expert  in  the  matter 
of  fire  protection  ought  to  be  the  fire  chief  and  not  the  fire 
commissioner.  Professional  expertness  is  imperative  in 
the  medical  health  officer,  but  not  in  members  of  the  health 
board.  It  is  essential  to  the  efficiency  of  the  city's  educa- 
tional system  that  the  superintendent  of  schools  shall  be 
skilled  in  school  management;  but  no  such  qualification 

1  Kansas  City,  by  its  freeholders'  charter  of  1909,  provides  for  the  classi- 
fication of  "all  positions  now  existing  or  hereafter  created  of  whatever 
function,  designation  or  compensation  in  each  and  every  branch  of  the 
civil  service  of  the  city,  except  such  positions  as  are  in  the  exempt  service 
or  in  the  labor  class."  Provision  is  made  that  all  such  classified  posts 
shall  be  filled  by  competitive  merit  tests,  devised  and  administered  by  a 
civil-service  board  made  up  of  three  members  appointed  by  the  mayor. 
This  arrangement  seems,  on  its  face,  to  embody  a  great  extension  of  civil- 
service  methods  in  municipal  administration;  but,  on  turning  to  the 
"exempt  service,"  one  finds  enumerated  within  this  category  not  only  the 
members  of  the  water,  park,  and  health  boards,  but  such  officials  as  the 
fire  chief,  the  city  auditor,  the  city  clerk,  the  city  assessor,  the  city  coun- 
sellor, and  in  some  cases  their  deputies  as  well.  The  Kansas  City  plan, 
despite_the_freciuency  with  which  it  is  cited  as  an  exampleoi 


going  civil-service  reform,  does  not  go  so  far  in  that  direction  as  the 


ragements  made  by  the  Boston  charter  amendments. 


g 
h 


THE   ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS  243 

ought  to  be  exacted  from  members  of  the  school  board, 
even  in  cities  where  these  members  are  appointed  by  the 
mayor. 

To  the  policy  of  selecting  the  heads  of  departments  by  sho 
competitive  tests  several  weighty  objections  have  been  raised, 
In  the  first  place,  as  President  Lowell  has  pointed  out,  "the 

'  •    "  by  competi- 


broad  intelligence  and  sound  judgment  required  "  from  those,  tm 
who  manage  administrative  departments  "can  hardly  be 
measured  by  any  examination  paper  designed  to  test  imme- 
diate fitness  for  special  duties."  The  competitive  test, 
however  comprehensive  and  concrete  it  may  be,  must  in- 
evitably relate  itself  to  the  work  which  a  candidate  will  be 
called  upon  to  perform  and  the  responsibilities  which  he 
will  be  expected  to  bear.  Since  the  work  of  a  department 
head  is  specialized,  the  test  must  be  somewhat  special  in 
its  nature.  But  special  tests  cannot  determine  general 
capacity,  and  the  theory  that  the  most  satisfactory  head  for 
a  department  is  one  who  displays  the  most  accurate  knowl- 
edge of  its  routine  functions  will  not  square  with  everyday 
facts.  There  are  so  many  points  at  which  a  department 
head  must  come  into  touch  with  the  voters,  with  the  city 
council,  and  with  other  administrative  officials  that  such 
qualities  as  tact,  prudence,  firmness,  knowledge  of  human 
nature,  ability  to  work  with  colleagues,  a  personality  that 
will  inspire  loyalty  on  the  part  of  subordinates  and  con- 
fidence on  the  part  of  superiors,  these  and  many  other  per- 
sonal traits  are  quite  as  essential  to  success  as  is  expertness 
in  the  technical  work  which  the  head  of  a  city  department 
has  to  do. 

The  qualities  of  mind  and  character  needed  in  the  executive  The  quaii- 
head  of  a  city  department  have  been  well  outlined  by  one 


cient  de- 


1  In  his  article  on  "Permanent  Officials  in  Municipal  Government," 
printed  in  Proceedings  of  the  National  Municipal  League,  1908,  especially 
p.  217. 


244  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

who,  in  a  professional  capacity,  has  been  in  close  contact  with 
city  affairs  in  a  large  way.  The  department  head  should 
have,  first  of  all,  "  integrity  and  executive  capacity.  He 
should  be  a  man  capable  of  managing  business  enterprises 
upon  business  principles  and  by  business  methods.  He  must, 
therefore,  be  a  man  of  sound  judgment  and  strong  character, 
equable  and  diplomatic  in  temperament,  and  a  good  judge 
of  men  and  of  human  nature.  He  must  have  the  ability  to 
decide  rightly  and  the  firmness  to  stand  by  his  decisions  when 
made.  He  should  have  had  experience  in  public  affairs  and 
business  enterprises.  Technical  education  or  training  is 
not  essential,  though  very  desirable.  ...  To  assume  that  a 
man  is  fitted  for  executive  work  solely  because  he  possesses 
technical  knowledge  or  experience  is  to  make  a  grave  mis- 
take ;  to  assume  that  he  is  not  a  capable  executive  because  of 
his  technical  training  is  to  make  a  still  graver  mistake." 1 
Work  that  is  professional  in  its  nature,  whether  in  private 
or  in  public  business,  cannot  be  done  satisfactorily  unless 
trained  men  are  employed  to  do  it.  Much  of  the  work  in 
every  city  department  is  professional  in  character,  and  must 
therefore  be  done  by  men  of  skill  if  it  is  to  be  done  well. 
But  there  is  also  much  that  needs  to  be  done  with  a  respon- 
siveness to  public  opinion  which  is  not  guaranteed  by  the 
mere  possession  of  expertness  on  the  part  of  those  who  do  it. 
Hence  it  happens  that  the  responsible  head  of  a  department 
must  have  that  general  administrative  capacity  which  is 
necessary  to  make  his  branch  of  the  city's  business  run  in 
popular,  as  well  as  in  efficient,  grooves ;  otherwise,  he  is  not 
likely  to  remain  in  office  very  long. 

The  need          In  the  adoption  of  a  method  of  selecting  department  heads 

traditions,     there  is  one  consideration  which  ought  never  to  be  overlooked. 

This  is  the  question  whether  the  plan  chosen  is  likely  to 

prove  a  final  or  only  a  temporary  solution  of  a  difficult  prob- 

1  Samuel  Whinery,  Municipal  Public  Works  (New  York,  1903),  20-21. 


THE   ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS  245 

lem.  Whatever  the  immediate  merits  of  anv  system  of 
appointments  may  be,  it  does  not  promise  a  definitive  means, 
of  putting  the  right  man  in  the  right  place  unless  it  paves  the, 
way  to  a  development  of  sound  traditions.  The  experience 
of  European  cities  is  more  illuminating  upon  this  point 
than  upon  any  other.  The  men  at  the  head  of  the  various 
branches  of  administration  in  these  municipalities  are  of 
unquestioned  capacity,  not  because  statutory  checks  have 
been  put  upon  the  freedom  of  the  appointing  authorities, 
but  because  public  opinion  would  not  brook  the  selection  of 
any  other  type.  In  America  public  opinion  has  not  reached 
the  stage  at  which  it  can  exert  any  such  influence ;  but  this 
is  not  to  say  that  sound  traditions  in  the  matter  of  municipal 
appointments  cannot  be  developed  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic 
as  well  as  on  the  other.  Even  in  England  they  are  almost 
wholly  the  product  of  the  last  seventy-five  years ;  and  in  a 
new  country,  where  traditions  develop  rapidly  when  they 
have  fair  opportunity,  the  time  required  ought  not  to  be  so 
long.  One  of  the  merits  of  the  Boston  plan^  of  securing  de- 
partment heads,  accordingly,  is  that  it  attempts  to  set  a 
sound  tradition  in  process  of  growth.  It  aims  to  force 
the  appointing  authority  into  rational  habits. 

Election  by  popular  vote,  appointment  by  the  city  council,  The  prao- 
appointment  by  the  mayor  with  the  concurrence  of  the  coun-  " 

cil  (or  the  upper  branch  of  it),  appointment  by  the  mayor 
alone,  and  appointment  by  the  mayor  with  the  confirmation 
of  a  civil-service  commission, — these  are  the  various  methods 
by  which  heads  of  municipal  departments  are  ordinarily 
chosen.  Election  by  the  voters  is  still  a  common  practice; 
there  are  few  large  cities  which  do  not  choose  some  of  their 
chief  administrative  officials  in  this  way.1  It  is  used  mainly, 

1  In  New  York  the  comptroller  is  elected ;  in  Philadelphia  the  comp- 
troller, the  city  treasurer,  and  the  recorder  of  taxes ;  in  Chicago  the  city 
clerk  and  the  city  treasurer ;  in  St.  Louis  about  a  dozen  department  heads ; 
in  Baltimore  the  comptroller  and  the  surveyor ;  and  so  on. 


246  GOVERNMENT   OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 

but  by  no  means  altogether,  as  a  means  of  selecting  financial 
officers,  such  as  the  city  comptroller,  the  treasurer,  or  the 
auditor.  In  general,  however,  it  is  the  least  satisfactory 
way  of  choosing  administrative  officials,  and  during  recent 
years  it  has  lost  ground  in  the  larger  municipalities.  Appoint- 
ment by  the  council  is  still  the  method  employed  in  many 
Southern  cities,  and  to  some  extent  it  is  used  in  cities  through- 
out other  sections  of  the  Union.1  In  cities  under  commission^ 
government  the  commissioners  are  themselves  the  heads 
oT  Tn?d5iei  administrative  departments.  Appointment  by 
the  mayor  with  the  concurrence  of  the  city  council  (or  of 
the  upper  branch  of  it,  when  there  are  two  branches)  remains, 
on  the  whole,  the  most  common  method  of  selecting  depart- 
ment heads.  Despite  the  organic  and  incidental  shortcom- 
ings of  the  system  of  aldermanic  confirmation,  the  merits  and 
defects  of  which  have  already  been  discussed,2  the  arrange- 
ment still  has  a  strong  anchorage  in  the  American  scheme 
of  local  government.  A  few  cities,  notably  New  York  and 
San  Francisco,  have  given  the  appointing  power  to  the  mayor 
alone,  requiring  no  concurrence  or  confirmation  of  his 
appointments,  —  a  plan,  all  things  considered,  better  than 
most  of  those  which  preceded  it.  Boston  is  as  yet  the  only 
American  city  to  put  the  appointment  of  department  heads  in 
control  of  the  mayor,  subject  to  confirmation  not  by  the  city 
council  or  any  branch  of  it,  but  by  a  state  civil-service 
commission. 

Selection  by       There  are  two  other  methods  of  securing  department  heads, 

authorities,    both  of  them  involving  action  by  authorities  outside  the 

city.     One  of  these  is  appointment  by  the  governor  or  by 

some  other  state  authority.     In  three  of  the  six  largest  cities 

of  the  United  States  (Boston,  St.  Louis,  and  Baltimore)  the 

1  In  New  York  and  Boston,  for  example,  where  the  council  appoints  th« 
city  clerk. 

2  Above,  pp.  227-229. 


THE   ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS  247 

head  of  the  police  department  is  named  by  the  state.  In 
Boston  this  headship  is  vested  in  a  single  commissioner 
appointed  by  the  governor  of  Massachusetts;1  in  St.  Louis 
the  police  department  is  in  charge  of  a  board  made  up  of 
four  commissioners  appointed  by  the  governor  of  Missouri, 
with  the  mayor  as  a  member  ex  officio?  In  Baltimore  the 
three  members  of  the  board  of  police  commissioners  are 
elected  by  the  two  houses  of  the  Maryland  legislature  sitting 
in  joint  session.3  Other  examples  of  state  appointment  to 
the  headships  of  municipal  departments  can  be  found  in 
some  cities,  but  they  are  now  rare  and  are  becoming  steadily 
more  so.4  This  is  a  form  of  state  interference  in  municipal 
affairs  which  is  strongly  resented  by  voters  in  the  cities  con- 
cerned. Although  it  has  in  some  cases  given  the  munici- 
pality a  better  type  of  official  than  would  have  been  secured 
by  its  own  efforts,  the  principle  involved  in  this  method  of 
appointment  is  not  palatable  to  the  citizens,  and  an  official  so 
named  is  therefore  forced  to  do  his  work  under  a  serious 
handicap. 

In   a   few   instances   appointments   to   policy-controlling,  Appoint- 
municipal  posts  are  made  bv  the  regular  state  courts.     In  rourts.y 
Philadelphia   the   board   of   school   controllers   consists   of 
forty-two  members,  named  by  the  judges  of  the  court  of 
common  pleas  for  the  city  and   county  of  Philadelphia. 
This  board  makes  the  annual  school  budget  and  elects  the 
superintendent   of   schools.     In   Chicago   the   South   Park 
Commissioners  are  named  by  the  judges  of  the  circuit  court 
of  Cook  county.     In  Boston  the  trustees  of  the  Franklin 
Fund  are  appointed  by  the  judges  of  the  supreme  court  of 

1  Acts  and  Resolves  of  Massachusetts,  1906,  ch.  291,  §  7. 

2  Laws  of  Missouri,  1899,  pp.  50  ff. 

3  Charter  of  Baltimore,  §  740. 

*  For  example,  the  West  Park  Commissioners  and  the  Lincoln  Park 
Board  in  Chicago,  and  the  Licensing  Board  and  the  Finance  Commission 
in  Boston. 


248 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


the  commonwealth.  Similar  instances  are  to  be  found  in 
other  cities.  The  ostensible  justification  offered  for  this 
plan  is  that  in  some  cases  it  provides  the  only  sure  method  of 
removing  a  department  from  thainfliie^ce  of  partisan  politics. 
When  no  one  else  —  the  voters  of  the  city,  the  city  council, 
the  mayor,  the  governor,  or  the  state  legislature  —  can 
be  trusted  to  make  strictly  non-political  appointments,  the 
courts  seem  to  be  the  only  other  public  authority  to  which 
recourse  can  be  had.  But  the  policy  embodies  very  dubious 
wisdom  at  best,  and  if  pursued  on  any  comprehensive  scale 
would  inevitably  draw  the  judiciary  into  the  orbit  of  partisan 
politics^  It  would  subject  the  judges  to  political  pressure, 
and  in  the  long  run  would  both  lower  the  personnel  of  the 
courts  and  impair  the  efficiency  with  which  they  perform 
their  regular  tasks  of  adjudication.  Whatever  benefits  might 
accrue  to  the  city  departments  whose  heads  could  be  ap- 
pointed in  this  way  would,  in  the  end,  be  more  than  offset  by 
the  unwholesome  reaction  which  the  assumption  of  such 
duties  would  force  upon  the  courts  themselves.1 
There-  Closely  related  to  the  system  of  appointing  heads  of 

cfeplrtment  administrative  departments  is  the  method  of  removing  them 
from  office.  When  such  officials  are  elected  by  popular 
vote,  there  is  usually  no  way  of  removing  them  (unless  for 
grave  misconduct)  until  their  terms  are  expired,  except  in 
those  cities  which  have  made  the  recall  arrangement  appli- 
cable to  them.2  If  the  city  council  appoints,  it  can  also 
usually  suspend  or  remove.  When  the  appointment  lies 
with  the  mayor  subject  to  confirmation  by  the  council  or  by 
some  branch  of  it,  the  concurrence  of  this  body  is  commonly 
required  to  remove  a  department  head  from  his  post ;  but 
when  the  mayor  alone  appoints,  he  has  usually  the  power  of 

1  For  a  further  discussion,  see  D.  B.  Eaton,  The  Government  of  Munici- 
palities (New  York,  1899),  eh.  xvii. 
1  See  below,  pp.  350-355. 


heads. 


THE   ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS  249 

removal,  either  with  or  without  a  public  hearing.  In  Boston. 
where  the  mayor  can  appoint  heads  of  city  departments  only 
with  the  assent  of  the  state  civil-service  commission,  the 
concurrence  of  this  body  is  not  necessary  to  removaL.  In 
a  few  cases  provision  has  been  made  for  the  displacement 
of  higher  city  officials  by  a  process  of  local  impeachment.1 
Most  cities  have  made  formal  rules  that  aim  to  prevent  thft 
removal  of-JhTsrh  offif.ifl.1a  .  ..wfohmit—  lust,  caiise!  these  often 
take  the  form  of  requirements  that  definite  charges  must  be 
made  in  writing  before  the  removal  can  take  place.  Few  of 
these  regulations  have  been  of  much  avail,  however  ;  for  the 
charges  may  be  couched  in  terms  too  general  to  permit  an 
effective  defence,  and  the^p  fc  nan  ally  nr> 


impartial  determination  of  the  question  as  to  whether  or  not 
the  complaints  are  well  p;roun^ed.2 

Much  effort  has  been  expended  by  the  framers  of  city  The  only 
charters  to  provide  securities  against  unfair  and  improper 
removals  from  higher  administrative  posts.     If  it  were  more 

«——«———-—  ^—   wrongful 

difficult  to  displace  men  who  are  already  at  the  head  of  civic  removals. 
departments,  the  pressure  for  purely  partisan  appointments 
would  not  be  so  great.  If  there  were  no  removals  except 
for  just  cause,  there  would  be  no  official  spoils  ;  and  if  there 
were  no  spoils,  there  could  be  no  spoils  system.  Almost 
\every  improper  appointment,  it  will  be  found,  has  come 
lupon  the  heels  of  an  unjust  removal.  Some  securities  for 
permanence  in  office  on  the  part  of  department  heads  are, 
accordingly,  much  to  be  desired;  but,  like  most  other  ef- 
fective safeguards  against  the  abuse  of  power,  they  are 
very  difficult  to  establish.  Laws  that  forbid  removals 
either  are  of  little  avail  or  are  liable  to  overreach  them- 
selves. They  avail  little  when  a  hostile  city  council  holds 

1  For  an  illustration,  see  the  provision  in  the  charter  of  Denver,  Colo- 
rado, §  163. 

2  See  also  below,  pp.  286-287. 


250  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

the  purse-strings  and  can  deny  the  appropriation  for  an 
official's  salary.  They  overreach  themselves  when  they 
operate  to  keep  in  office  a  man  who  no  longer  can  work  in 
some  degree  of  harmony  with  the  elected  representatives 
of  the  voters.  For  the  general  direction  of  administrative 
affairs  the  mayor  is  deemed  responsible  to  the  citizens. 
To  be  properly  accountable  he  must  be  in  control,  if  he 
has  no  right  to  remove  chiefs  of  departments,  he  can  all  too_ 
readily  disclaim  responsibility  for  what  they  do.  If  these 
officers  are  not  elected,  and  are  not  held  accountable  to 
the  appointing  authority,  they  are  devoid  of  direct  re- 
sponsibility ;  and  power  without  responsibility  is  none 
the  less  intolerable  because  those  who  wield  it  may  have 
been  originally  chosen  on  their  merits.  This  principle  was 
recognized  in  the  New  York  charter  amendments  of  1901 
and  in  the  Boston  amendments  of  1909,  both  of  which  gave 
the  mayor  full  power  to  remove  heads  of  departments  with- 
out the  concurrence  of  any  other  authority,  either  state  or 
municipal.  That  is  the  procedure  followed  in  the  cities  of 
Great  Britain,  where  the  council,  which  is  the  appointing 
authority,  may  remove  a  city  official  at  any  time  and  for 
any  cause.  The  only  security  against  the  abuse  of  this  dis- 
cretion in  English  cities  is  a  public  opinion  which  requires 
councillors  to  work  in  harmony  with  the  administrative  chiefs 
and  militates  against  the  reelection  of  those  who  fail  to  do 
so.  A  similar  security  is  the  only  thing  which  can  ever 
permanently  avail  in  the  cities  of  the  United  States.  Public 
opinion,  if  developed  in  the  right  direction,  can  accomplish 
what  laws  have  thus  far  failed  to  do ;  and  one  way  to  develop 
public  opinion  is  to  throw  the  responsibility  upon  it. 
tribution  of  American  cities  differ  considerably  in  the  number  of  ad- 
fanctions1  nn'nistrative  departments  which  they  maintain.  In  New 
among  York  there  are  fifteen  regular  city  departments  (not  including 

depart- 

meats.          the  five  borough  administrations),  besides  almost  a  score 


THE  ADMINISTRATIVE  DEPARTMENTS  251 

of  boards  and  officials  that  do  not  come  within  the  super- 
vision of  these  regular  departments.1  In  Chicago  there  are 
twelve  chief  departments,  most  of  them  organized  under 
ordinances  of  the  city  council.  Philadelphia  has  only  eleven 
departments,  all  of  them  provided  for  in  the  city  charter ; 2 
St.  Louis  has  sixteen,  and  Boston  has  more  than  thirty.3 
Smaller  cities  usually  find  eight  or  ten  departments  ample, 
and  those  which  have  adopted  the  commission  type  of  govern- 
ment are  able  to  manage  affairs  with  only  five.4  In  the  or- 
dinary municipality  of  medium  size  there  are,  perhaps,  a 
half-dozen  distinct  branches  of  administration  requiring 
separate  management.  These  are,  for  instance,  the  munici- 
pal jaw  department,  the  department  of  finance  (which  may 
include  assessments,  taxes,  the  treasurer's  office,  and  audit), 
the  department  of  piifrliq  safety  (including  police,  fire  pro- 
tection, licensing,  and  building  inspection),  the  department 
of  public  works  (including  the  construction  and  maintenance 
of  public  buildings,  streets,  sewers,  parks,  playgrounds,  and 
so  forth),  the  department  of  public  health  (including  sanita- 
tion, hospitals,  inspection  of  foodstuffs,  control  of  markets, 
weights  and  measures,  and  similar  matters),  and  the  depart- 

1  The  regular  departments  are :  (1)  finance,  (2)  taxes  and  assessments, 
(3)  law,  (4)  education,  (5)  police,  (6)  fire  protection,  (7)  street  cleaning, 

(8)  water  supply,  gas,  and  electricity,  (9)  parks,  (10)  bridges,  (11)  docks 
and  ferries,  (12)  health,  (13)  tenement  house,  (14)  public  charities,  (15) 
correction. 

2  These  are :  (1)  education,  (2)  taxes,  (3)  city  treasurer,  (4)  controller, 
(5)  law,  (6)  sinking-fund  commission,  (7)  public  safety,  (8)  public  works, 

(9)  public  health  and  charities,  (10)  supplies,   (11)  wharves,  docks,  and 
ferries. 

3  The  reason  for  the  large  number  of  departments  in  Boston  is  to  be 
found  in  the  fact  that  for  many  years  prior  to  1909  heads  of  departments 
were  about  the  only  higher  administrative  officers  exempt  from  civil- 
service  regulations.     To  provide  for  political  spoilsmen,  therefore,  new 
departments  were  frequently  created  by  ordinance. 

4  For  the  scheme  of  administrative  organization  in  commission  cities, 
see  E.  S.  Bradford,  Commission  Government  in  American  Cities  (New  York, 
1911),  ch.  xvii. 


252 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


ment  of  education,  in  charge  of  the  municipal  school  and 
public-library  systems. 

There  seems  to  be  no  very  good  reason  why,  save  in  very 
large  cities,  the  whole  administration  should  not  be  ap- 
portioned in  these  six  departments,  each  of  which,  again, 
might  be  organized  into  two  or  more  divisions  or  bureaus. 
Apart  from  those  municipalities  which  have  simplified  their 
administrative  machinery  by  the  introduction  of  commission 
government,  there  is  scarcely  a  city  in  the  country  that  does 
not  possess  a  departmental  organization  too  complicated  for 
its  needs.1  Not  only  does  this  result  in  a  failure  to  get  a 
dollar's  worth  of  service  for  a  dollar's  expenditure,  but  it  pre- 
vents the  heads  of  departments  from  forming,  as  they  might 
profitably  do,  a  sort  of  mayor's  cabinet  that  might  meet  fre- 
quently and  by  the  frank  discussion  of  current  projects  serve 
to  put  more  team  play  into  the  work  of  making  the  city's 
revenue  match  its  expenses.  Five  or  six  department  heads 
can  do  this ;  fifteen  or  twenty  cannot.  That  service  which 
cabinet  meetings  render  to  the  national  administration  is 
rarely  obtained  in  city  affairs. 

Next  to  the  general  distribution  of  municipal  work  among 
commission-  departments,  comes  the  question  whether  the  citv  depart- 
ments ought  to  be  put  in  charge  of  boards  or  single  commi^- 
sioners.  There  was  a  time  when  the  board  plan  was  more 
in  favor,  but  in  recent  years  the  pendulum  of  popularity 
has  swung  to  the  one-man  system  of  departmental  supervision. 

1  To  determine  just  what  scheme  of  administrative  organization  prom- 
ises the  greatest  efficiency  in  any  large  city  requires  a  large  amount  of 
investigation  and  a  careful  consideration  of  the  many  interests  involved. 
A  very  good  example  of  the  way  in  which  the  problem  ought  to  be  ap- 
proached is  afforded  by  the  report  issued  in  1909  by  the  Memphis 
Bureau  of  Municipal  Research :  Memphis ;  a  Critical  Study  of  its  Munici- 
pal Government,  with  Constructive  Suggestions  for  Betterment  in  Organizes 
tion  and  Administrative  Methods.  See  also  the  various  articles  on  "  Effi- 
ciency in  City  Government "  in  the  Annals  of  the  American  Academy  of 
Social  and  Political  Science  for  May,  1912. 


boards 

versus 


THE   ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS  253 

Board  administration  has,  however,  some  important  ad-  Advantages 
vantages.  In  the  first  place,  there  are  certain  departments 
which,  from  the  very  character  of  the  work  that  comes  within 
their  jurisdiction,  are  well  suited  to  the  board  system.  The 
school  department,  quite  obviously,  is  one  of  these.  So  is 
the  department  of  public  libraries ;  and  so,  likewise,  although  i.  it  is  well 
perhaps  to  a  less  pronounced  degree,  are  the  departments  of 
poor  relief,  hospitals,  and  public  recreation.  These  are 
branches  of  the  city's  business  in  which  deliberation  and 
care  are  essential  to  success,  in  which  different  temperaments 
and  different  points  of  view  may  contribute  to  prudent 
action.  On  the  other  hand,  the  city's  law  department,  its 
police  and  fire-protection  services,  and  some  other  like 
branches  of  municipal  administration,  are  quite  as  clearly 
unsuited  to  competent  direction  by  more  than  a  single  head. 
In  the  same  city  there  is_,  accordingly,  room  for  both  systems^ 
each  to  be  employed  where  the  conditions  demancL 

Again,  the  board  plan  can  be  used  to  facilitate  continuity  2.  it  can  be 
of  departmental  policy  wherever  this  seems  to  be  a  requisite  curecon^" 
of    satisfactory    administration.     A    single    commissioner,  tiDui*yof 

«••••••••••«"••  '    adnmua- 

when  his  term  expires,  takes  his  policy  out  of  office  with  trative 
him;  for  his  successor,  particularly  if  he  be  chosen  by  a 
new  administration,  is  apt  to  depart  from  the  beaten  path 
if  only  to  advertise  his  own  initiative.  Hence,  departments 
in  charge  of  single  heads  often  fail  to  develop  comprehensive 
policies.  They  cannot  map  out  plans  over  fair  periods  of 
time,  for  things  done  during  one  term  are  likely  to  be  undone 
in  the  next.  With  a  board  of  three  or  five  members  in 
charge,  on  the  contrary,  a  system  of  partial  renewal  at  stated 
times  can  be  employed  to  prevent  any  loss  of  continuity. 
Changes  of  policy  will  then  come  gradually,  and  not  be 
dependent  upon  the  judgment  or  the  caprice  of  a  single  indi- 
vidual, obviously  a  very  important  consideration  in  depart- 
ments like  education  and  public  improvements.  It  will  be 


254 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


3.  It  can  be 

used  to 
afford  rep- 
resentation 
of  diverse 
interests. 


found  that  in  the  interest  of  prudence,  no  less  than  in  that 
of  sequence  in  policy,  practically  all  large  state  and  national 
undertakings  are  intrusted  to  boards  rather  than  to  single 
officials. 

Furthermore,  an  administrative  board  may  be  so  consti- 
tuted as  to  afford  representation  to  any  interest,  whether 
geographical,  social  or  pnlitinftl.  whio.h  mav  seem  to  be. 
entitled  thereto.  It  may  well  be  questioned  whether  there 
are  many  city  departments  in  which  the  representation  of 
several  interests  can  be  otherwise  than  harmful ;  but  there 
are  a  few,  at  least,  in  which  a  denial  of  representation  is  sure 
to  provoke  much  popular  opposition.  In  the  administration 
of  the  city's  schools,  for  example,  the  board  system 
can  be  employed  to  allay  the  misgivings  of  those  who 
would  be  forever  alleging  religious  and  social  discrimina- 
tion, were  a  single  commissioner,  whatever  his  creed  or  class, 
in  complete  control  of  the  staff  and  curriculum.  In  the  de- 
partment which  determines  the  location  of  public  improve- 
ments, again,  the  different  geographical  divisions  of  the 
city  are  insistent  in  their  demand  for  representation  lest 
their  special  needs  be  overlooked.  Then  there  are  some  de- 
partments that  have  tasks  of  a  semi-political  nature  to  per- 
form, in  regard  to  which  both  political  parties  want  to  be 
heard.  Such  departments  are  those  which  have  in  charge 
the  listing  or  registration  of  voters,  or  the  conduct  of  prima- 
ries and  elections.  To  put  a  single  commissioner  in  full  con- 
trol of  such  matters  is  to  intrust  the  decision  of  partisan 
questions  to  one  whose  political  affiliations  or  antecedents 
inevitably  come  forward  in  the  public  mind  as  the  real 
motive  of  his  acts.  Not  that  bi-partisan  boards  have  been 
conspicuously  successful  in  American  cities ;  they  have,  on 
the  contrary,  too  frequently  been  the  centres  of  political 
friction  and  chicane.  But  there  is  a  flavor  of  unfairness  in 
intrusting  functions  that  cannot  be  wholly  withdrawn  from 


THE   ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS  255 

litics  to  anv  single  umpire  whose  affiliations 
with  one  of  the  contestants.     Hence  the 
bi-partisan  board,  even  with  its  almost  inevitable  wrangles, 
becomes  a  necessary  concession  to  popular  notions  of  fair 
play. 

Again,  the  board  system  can  frequently  be  supported  on  4.  it  often 
the  score  of  economy.  In  municipalities  of  any  considerable 
size  the  work  of  administering  a  city  department  is  usually 
enough  to  take  the  most  of  any  one  man's  time.  If  it  be  in- 
trusted wholly  to  one  man,  either  he  must  be  one  whose 
private  wealth  enables  him  to  serve  the  city  without  mone- 
tary recompense  or  he  must  receive  a  salary.  As  it  scarcely 
seems  desirable  that  none  but  men  of  wealth  should  be 
eligible  to  department  headships,  the  single-commissioner 
system  involves  the  practice  of  paying  substantial  stipends. 
In  smaller  cities  these  salaries,  if  paid  in  every  department  and 
if  fixed  at  figures  sufficient  to  draw  competent  experts  into 
the  municipal  service,  would  involve  a  considerable  drain 
upon  the  city  treasury.  Moreover,  as  Professor  Goodnow 
has  pointed  out,  it  would  probably  mean  the  filling  of  higher 
municipal  offices  by  "  men  who  make  politics  their  profession, 
obtaining  their  livelihood  from  the  emolument  of  the  various 
offices  they  fill,  one  after  the  other."  l  This  is  exactly  what 
has  resulted,  in  many  smaller  cities  of  the  United  States, 
from  the  replacing  of  boards  by  single  department  heads. 
Encouragement  has  been  given,  not  to  the  professional_ 
administrator,  but  to  the  professional  salary-seeker. 

The,  board  system,  furthermore,  offers  some  advantaes  in  5.  it  baa  a 


the  way  of  bringing  t.hft  ordinary  pitmen  into  contact  with 
civic  affairs  and  thereby  of  incren-si"fy  \\™  nyir>  ^""q^onj  value' 
Resting  upon  the  idea  that  the  amateur  has  a  place  in  the 
city's  administrative  service,  it  permits  men  drawn  from 
the   business   and   professional   life   of  the   community  to 

1  City  Government  in  the  United  States  (New  York,  1904),  193. 


256  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

take  their  share  of  public  service  without  too  much  per- 
sonal sacrifice.  What  may  require  the  entire  time  of  one 
man  need  take  only  the  leisure  of  five.  There  are  always 
some  city  departments  in  which  the  work  is  of  such  a  nature 
that  it  can  be  divided  easily  and  even  to  advantage.  The 
various  members  of  a  board  can  be  put  in  immediate  charge 
of  the  things  for  which  their  private  vocations  have  best 
fitted  them  or  in  which  they  happen  to  take  most  interest. 
This,  indeed,  is  the  practice  pursued  by  most  boards  ;  hence 
the  idea  that  the  board  system  tends  to  diffuse  responsibility 
is  not  often  sustained  by  actual  experience.  On  questions  of 
general  policy  administrative  boards  usually  act  as  a  whole, 
but  on  the  host  of  detailed  matters  that  come  before  them 
their  action  is  more  often  determined  by  the  advice  of  that 
particular  member  who  is  most  familiar  with  the  special  point 
at  issue.  It  is  with  this  in  mind  that  a  mayor  very  often  so 
constitutes  a  board  as  to  secure  the  representation  of  different 
talents  upon  it. 

The  board         The  board  plan  can  be  made  to  operate  satisfactorily, 
however,  only  when  the  subordinate  officials  of  the  deartr 


dent  only      ment  are  chosen  by  some  well-ad  rT^njfitered  merit  system. 

officials  are  The  latter  is  necessary  not  only  to  assure  in  the  personnel 
of  the  department  that  professional  skill  and  knowledge 
which  members  of  the  board  cannot  be  called  upon  to  supply, 
but  also  to  protect  the  latter  against  the  pressure  of  patron- 
age-seekers. When  this  safeguard  is  provided,  the  unpaid 
board  can  render  an  important  service  by  keeping  adminis- 
trative policy  in  touch  with  popular  sentiment,  by  steering 
the  city's  administrative  methods  from  the  ruts  into  which 
professionalism  is  likely  to  run,  and  by  standing  as  a  buffer 
between  the  political  machine  and  the  men  who  are  on 
the  department  pay-roll.  The  branch  of  American  city 
administration  which  has  in  general  been  managed  most 
efficiently,  and  has  at  the  same  time  been  most  constantly 


THE   ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS  257 

in  tune  with  public  opinion,  is  the  school  department.  It 
is  in  this  field  of  administration,  perhaps,  that  we  have  the 
least  to  learn  from  the  cities  of  Europe.  Yet  this  depart- 
ment has  been  almost  everywhere  intrusted  to  an  unpaid 
board.  Under  direct  control  of  the  board,  however,  is  an 
expert  in  educational  administration  usually  called  the 
superintendent  of  schools,  who  supplies  such  special  knowl- 
edge as  the  board  may  need,  and  whose  advice  on  technical 
questions  carries  due  weight  with  his  lay  superiors. 

It  does  not  follow,  of  course,  that  a  similar  system  would  Depart- 
be  best  for  the  department  of  police  or  fire  protection,  where  which  the 


promptness  of  decision,  firmness  in  the  maintenance  of  dis- 

f  f  misaioner 

cipline,  and  capacity  for  vigorous  action  are  the  qualities  system  is  to 
most  to  be  sought  for  in  departmental  direction.  In  these  ferred. 
and  some  other  departments  the  superior  efficiency  of  the, 
single-commissioner  system  can  be  so  easily  recognized  as 
to  warrant  the  city  in  foregoing  any  incidental  advantages 
which  the  board  form  might  provide.  The  latter  still  has 
its  place,  however;  and  the  ruthless  way  in  which  some 
cities  have  displaced  it  seems  to  indicate  that  its  possibili- 
ties have  not  always  been  sufficiently  emphasized.  Profes- 
sor Goodnow  has  suggested  that  the  drift  of  American  social 
and  business  organization  is  unfavorable  to  the  board  idea, 
since  all  big  business  enterprises  are  nowadays  whirled  on 
a  one-man  pivot.  It  is  the  bank  president,  not  its  direc- 
tors, who-  in  reality  dominates  the  institution.  Directors 
who  really  direct  have  almost  become  figments  of  popular 
imagination.  Centralization  of  authority  makes  for  effi- 
ciency ;  and  when,  as  in  business,  the  principle  of  organiza- 
tion is  not  necessarily  democratic,  efficiency  is  likely  to  be  the 
controlling  aim.  In  public  affairs,  however,  this  is  a  policy 
which  cannot  wisely  be  followed  without  some  deviation^ 

The  terms  of  office  given  to  department  heads,  whether  The  terms 

of  depart- 

they  be  single  commissioners  or  members  of  a  board,  ought  ment  head*. 


258  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

to  be  longer  than  those  usually  provided.  The  prejudice 
against  extended  terms  is  deeply  rooted  in  the  United  States ; 
it  harks  back  to  the  days  when  public  offices  were  every- 
where regarded  as  prizes  which  lucky  individuals  ought  not 
to  hold  too  long.  The  idea  that  city  offices  ought  to  go 
round,  ought  to  be  passed  along  the  line  at  intervals  to  those 
who  had  borne  the  burden  and  heat  of  political  battle,  is 
one  of  the  hallucinations  that  were  too  long  suffered  to  pass 
muster  as  sound  principles  of  democracy.  When  the  office 
of  departmental  chief  is  regarded  as  a  difficult  and  none  too 
remunerative  occupation  which  only  capable  men  can  oc- 
cupy, and  then  only  at  some  private  sacrifice,  there  will  be  less 
pressure  in  favor  of  shortening  official  terms.  How  long  a 
commissioner  in  charge  of  a  city  department  should  be  ap- 
pointed to  serve  depends  somewhat  upon  the  nature  of  the 
tasks  which  he  has  to  perform.  If  the  department  be  one 
which  plans  its  work  over  a  number  of  years,  the  head  should 
at  least  be  retained  for  such  space  of  time  as  may  be  neces- 
sary to  bring  his  own  plans  to  fruition.  If  he  is  to  be  judged 
by  results,  he  should  have  time  enough  to  make  the  results 
his  own.  A  term  long  enough  to  plan  and  produce  returns, 
yet  not  so  long  as  to  inspire  a  disregard  of  popular  sentiment, 
is  what  the  head  of  a  citv  department  ought  to  have,..  This 
may  well  be  six  years ;  it  ought  rarely,  if  ever,  to  be  less 
tnan  tn7eeT*Where  tenure  of  administrative  oihce  is  con- 
cerned,  it  is  better  in  case  of  doubt  to  err  on  the  side  of 
liberality.  Indefinite  terms  are  not  regarded  as  satisfactory 
either  by  the  voters  in  general  or  by  the  officials  themselves. 
Too  often  they  encourage  persistent  interference  to  secure 
the  removal  of  an  officer. 
Reappoint-  More  to  be  desired,  however,  than  lon,g  terms  is  the  tradi- 
tion  of  reappomtment.  That  such  tradition  can  be  de- 
veloped is  shown  by  the  experience  of  some  American  cities 
in  which  certain  heads  of  departments  have  through  sue- 


THE   ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS  259 

cessive  reappointments  held  their  positions  for  ten,  fifteen, 
or  even  twenty  years.  Much  has  been  said  by  American 
writers  on  municipal  government  concerning  the  long  periods 
over  which  the  chief  officers  of  English  city  departments 
have  been  suffered  to  remain  unmolested ;  but  a  detailed 
examination  of  actual  conditions  in  the  cities  of  the  two 
countries  would  probably  disclose  that  the  difference  in  this 
respect  is  not  so  great  as  is  commonly  imagined.  It  must 
be  remembered,  moreover,  that  the  facility  with  which  a  city 
official  can,  for  his  own  advancement,  pass  from  municipal 
to  private  employment  is  much  less  marked  in  England 
than  it  is  in  this  country.  When  the  head  of  a  city  depart- 
ment in  the  United  States  gives  up  his  post  after  a  few 
years  of  service,  it  does  not  always  mean  that  he  has  been 
denied  reappointment.  Very  often  it  is  because  he  has 
discovered  a  more  lucrative  opening  in  some  other  field. 
A  successful  organizer  and  administrator  in  the  city's  ser- 
vice soon  catches  the  eye  of  some  private  corporation  which 
is  willing  to  pay  him  more  than  the  city  is  ready  to  offer. 

The  remedy  for  this  would,  of  course,  be  to  pay  higher  The  salaries 
salaries  to  successful  heads  of  departments.  But  the  scale  menUieads. 
of  municipal  salaries  is  not  fixed  on  a  basis  of  what  the  best 
service  is  worth ;  it  is  rather  a  question  of  what  public  opin- 
ion is  ready  to  tolerate.  To  the  president  and  directors  of 
a  public-service  corporation  ten  thousand  dollars  per  annum 
is  very  little  to  pay  for  the  services  of  a  man  who  can  do 
large  things  easily ;  to  the  eyes  of  the  average  voter  it  looks 
like  a  small  fortune.  For  what  the  American  city  wants, 
and  ought  to  have,  in  the  way  of  efficient  legal,  engineering, 
financial,  sanitary,  and  educational  skill,  it  will  have  to  pay 
more  than  it  is  paying  at  present.  It  must  buy  its  adminis- 
trative skill  in  the  open  market  at  current  prices  for  a  stated 
quality.  It  must  pay  even  higher  sums  than  private  em- 
ployers of  skill,  for  the  expert  who  hires  with  the  city  must 


260 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Gains  in 
efficiency 
to  be  had 
by  a  proper 
coordina- 
tion of 
depart- 
ments. 


prepare  to  serve  a  fickle  master.  Compared  with  English, 
French,  or  German  municipalities,  the  American  city  may 
seem  to  be  paying  its  chief  officials  quite  enough ;  but  that 
is  not  the  viewpoint  from  which  comparisons  should  be 
made.  The  chief  officials  of  foreign  cities  take  much  of 
their  real  remuneration  in  the  honor  that  attaches  to  their 
posts,  in  the  security  of  tenure  which  they  enjoy,  and  in  the 
liberal  pension  provisions  that  are  made  for  them  on  re- 
tirement. American  cities  give  none  of  these  things.  The 
only  profitable  comparison  is  that  which  may  be  made  be- 
tween the  salaries  paid  for  skill  and  service  of  the  same  qual- 
ity in  municipal  and  in  private  business.  From  this  point 
of  view,  the  city's  scale  is  too  low  in  the  higher  branches  of 
its  service  and  too  high  in  the  lower  grades.  On  the  whole, 
much  has  been  done  in  recent  years  to  improve  this  situa- 
tion; but  the  city's  handicap  is  not  yet  by  any  means 
overcome.1 

While  much  of  the  responsibility  for  efficiency  or  ineffi- 
ciency in  the  conduct  of  the  city's  business  will  always  de- 
pend upon  the  spirit  and  capacity  of  the  men  who  are  at  the 
heads  of  the  various  departments,  not  a  little  also  hinges 
upon  the  way  in  which  the  work  is  distributed  to  the  several 
administrative  authorities,  and  upon  the  care  with  which 
departments  are  themselves  internally  organized.  A  dis- 
tribution of  functions  which  leaves  gaps,  or  which  causes 
overlapping,  or  which  from  its  lack  of  definiteness  gives 
frequent  basis  for  friction,  is  all  too  common  in  large  cities 
and  proves  a  fertile  source  of  wastefulness.  Take  the  whole 
field  of  municipal  public  works,  for  example.  Reason  and 
experience  both  dictate  that  this  entire  branch  of  city  ad- 
ministration should  be  centralized  in  a  single  department; 
yet  very  rarely  is  that  policy  followed.  Street  improvements 


1  For  a  discussion  in  regard  to  pensions  to  city  officials,  see  below,  pp. 
290-292. 


THE   ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS  261 

are  put  in  charge  of  one  authority,  sewer  construction  is  in 
the  hands  of  another,  and  the  extension  of  the  water-supply 
system  is  intrusted  to  a  third.  Each  of  the  three  then  pro- 
ceeds to  its  own  work  without  reference  to  the  plans  of  the 
others,  with  the  result  that  all  too  frequently  there  is  over- 
lapping of  effort,  or  friction,  delay,  and  unnecessary  outlays 
of  both  time  and  money.  That  most  American  cities  have 
more  departments  than  they  really  need  is  a  sufficient  ob- 
stacle to  efficiency,  but  even  worse  than  the  multiplication 
of  these  divisions  is  the  failure  of  cities  to  make  them  work 
in  cooperation. 

Another  prolific  cause  of  waste  both  in  labor  and  in  ma-  Gains  to  be 
terials  is  the  faulty  internal  organization  of  individual  de- 
partments.  In  all  successful  business  establishments  two 
or  three  fundamental  rules  of  organization  are  observed  as 
a  matter  of  course;  yet  by  municipal  corporations  which 
perform  tasks  of  almost  identically  the  same  general  char- 
acter these  rules  are  often  disregarded  altogether.  One 
of  them  is  the  commonplace  principle  that  the  lines  of  re- 
sponsibility for  every  separate  branch  of  a  business  should 
converge  in  some  one  individual  or  group  of  individuals. 
In  other  words,  no  subordinate  officer  should  be  allowed  to 
hold  a  place  of  isolation  so  far  as  his  responsibility  is  con- 
cerned. In  large  industrial  enterprises  the  buying,  manu- 
facturing, and  selling  branches  of  the  business  are  com- 
mitted to  separate  departments,  each  with  its  own  head. 
These  departments  may  be  subdivided  again,  but  the  hier- 
archy of  accountability  is  always  rigidly  preserved.  In  the 
management  of  the  city's  business,  however,  this  principle 
rarely  gains  anything  like  full  recognition.1  The  heads  of 

1  The  report  on  "Business  Methods  of  New  York  City's  Police  Depart- 
ment," issued  by  the  New  York  Bureau  of  Municipal  Research  in  1910, 
affords  abundant  illustration  of  the  way  in  which  the  ordinary  rules  of 
everyday  business  are  sometimes  disregarded  in  the  conduct  of  a  munici- 
pal department. 


£262 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


some  departments  are  chosen  by  the  mayor  and  are  re- 
sponsible to  him  alone;  the  heads  of  others  are  chosen  by 
the  city  council  and  are  responsible  to  it ;  and  the  heads  of 
still  others  are  elected  by  the  voters  and  are  responsible  to 
them.  The  inevitable  result  is  inter-departmental  jealousy 
and  often  open  antagonism.  The  street  department  puts 
down  a  new  pavement,  only  to  find  that  the  water  or  sewer- 
age authorities  have  planned  to  relay  their  mains  in  that 
particular  thoroughfare.  Friction  between  departments  is 
in  some  cities  a  matter  of  almost  daily  occurrence.  Police 
and  licensing  authorities  failing  to  work  in  unison,  the  city's 
sanitary  department  clashing  with  the  board  of  health,  the 
fire  department  at  issue  with  the  department  of  buildings 
inspection,  —  these  are  incidents  that  have  become  so  com- 
mon as  hardly  to  cause  comment  outside  of  the  administra- 
tive circles  immediately  concerned.  All  this  is  fatal  to  the 
development  of  economical  administrative  methods,  for 
with  divided  responsibility  much  duplication  of  work  is  un- 
avoidable. The  existing  situation  is  all  the  more  exasper- 
ating from  the  fact  that  it  continues  for  no  other  reason  than 
because  political  and  personal  influences  are  permitted  to 
stand  in  the  way  of  desirable  consolidations  and  readjust- 
ments of  departmental  functions. 

In  modern  city  charters  too  little  attention  has  been  given 
to  the  way  in  which  the  actual  work  of  the  municipality  shall 
be  done.  The  task  of  organizing  the  various  departments, 
and  of  determining  the  branches  into  which  these  depart- 
ments shall  be  divided,  has  usually  been  left  to  the  discretion 
of  the  city  council.  This  body,  unfortunately,  has  very 
rarely  shown  itself  capable  of  handling  such  matters  without 
regard  to  political  considerations;  and  the  result  has  been 
the  development  of  administrative  machinery  which  no 
private  business  could  long  maintain  without  ceasing  to 
pay  dividends.  The  bestowal  of  more  care  upon  what  may 


THE   ADMINISTRATIVE   DEPARTMENTS  263 

be  termed  the  business  provisions  of  city  charters  would, 
probably   find   ample   repayment    in    the   results   thereby 


REFERENCES 

Concerning  the  general  organization  and  functions  of  administrative 
departments  in  American  cities  very  little  trustworthy  material  has  as  yet 
been  brought  together.  The  facts  can  be  assembled  only  by  a  careful 
examination  of  city  charters,  ordinances,  and  departmental  regulations. 
The  best  single  source  of  information  is  A.  R.  Hatton's  Digest  of  City 
Charters  (Chicago,  1906),  especially  pp.  272-351  ;  but  administrative 
changes  have  been  numerous  since  the  publication  of  this  useful  volume. 
Various  reports  issued  during  the  last  few  years  by  bureaus  of  municipal 
research  and  similar  institutions  have  dealt  with  the  problems  of  depart- 
mental reorganization  in  individual  cities.  Quite  the  best  among  these 
is  the  report  entitled  A  Preliminary  Survey  of  certain  Departments  of  the 
Government  of  the  City  of  St.  Louis,  with  Constructive  Suggestions  for  Changes 
in  Organization  and  Method,  prepared  by  the  New  York  Bureau  of  Mu- 
nicipal Research  and  printed  under  authority  of  the  St.  Louis  city  council 
in  1910.  Another  suggestive  study,  compiled  by  the  same  bureau  and 
entitled  The  Organization,  Duties,  and  the  Administrative  and  Accounting 
Procedure  of  the  Department  of  the  President  of  the  Borough  of  Manhattan 
of  the  City  of  New  York  (June,  1910),  contains  several  excellent  charts  il- 
lustrating the  principles  upon  which  municipal  departments  ought  to  be 
organized.  Many  constructive  suggestions  for  bettering  the  city's  busi- 
ness methods  may  be  found  in  the  report  on  the  administrative  organiza- 
tion of  Memphis,  made  by  the  Bureau  of  Municipal  Research  in  that  city 
in  October,  1909.  Mention  may  also  be  made  of  the  special  number  of 
the  Annals  of  the  American  Academy  of  Social  and  Political  Science  on 
"Efficiency  in  City  Government  (May,  1912).  Reports  of  the  same  gen- 
eral nature  have  been  issued  by  the  Bureau  of  Municipal  Research  in 
Philadelphia,  by  the  Chicago  Bureau  of  Public  Efficiency,  and  by  corre- 
sponding institutions  in  several  other  cities.  The  Reports  of  the  Boston 
Finance  Commission  (7  vols.,  Boston,  1908-1912)  also  contain  much 
material  relating  to  problems  of  local  administrative  organization. 

A  general  survey  of  administrative  organization  and  methods,  which 
retains  considerable  value  despite  the  fact  that  it  was  written  more  than 
a  decade  ago,  is  the  chapter  on  "Administrative  Officials"  in  J.  A.  Fairlie's 
Municipal  Administration  (New  York,  1901)  ;  and  there  is  a  good  chapter 
on  "Public  Works  Administration"  in  the  same  author's  Essays  in  Mu- 
nicipal Administration  (New  York,  1908).  Some  general  information  may 
also  be  found  in  F.  J.  Goodnow's  Municipal  Government  (New  York,  1909), 
especially  chs.  xi.-xvi.,  and  in  his  Municipal  Problems  (New  York,  1904)  ; 
in  M.  N.  Baker's  Municipal  Engineering  and  Sanitation  (New  York,  1902), 
chs.  xxxiv.-xxxv.  ;  Samuel  Whinery's  Municipal  Public  Works  (New  York, 


264  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

1903),  ohs.  ii.-viii. ;  and  D.  F.  Wiloox's  Government  of  Great  American 
Cities  (New  York,  1910),  chs.  iii.-vii.  The  rules  of  law  relating  to  adminis- 
trative organization  and  functions  are  set  forth  in  J.  F.  Dillon's  Law  of 
Municipal  Corporations  (5  vols.,  Boston,  1911),  especially  vol.  I.  §§  98- 
421 ;  and  in  Eugene  McQuillan's  Law  of  Municipal  Corporations  (6  vols., 
Chicago,  1911-1912),  II.  962  ff. 

Some  interesting  judicial  decisions  in  the  same  field  are  printed  in 
J.  H.  Beale's  Selection  of  Cases  on  the  Law  of  Municipal  Corporations 
(Cambridge,  1911),  especially  pp.  203-239. 


CHAPTER  XI 

MUNICIPAL  OFFICIALS  AND  EMPLOYEES 

THE  proper  handling  of  its  labor  force,  skilled  and  un-  The  city's 
skilled,  is  one  of  the  most  perplexing  problems  of  routine  jgmor  prob~ 
administration  in  American  cities.  How  should  the  great 
body  of  municipal  officials  and  employees,  from  the  deputy 
head  of  a  department  at  a  large  annual  stipend  to  the  com- 
mon sewer-digger  at  two  dollars  a  day,  be  chosen  from  the 
range  of  expert  and  crude  labor  available?  How  may  the 
maintenance  of  discipline  among  them  be  best  assured  ?  By 
what  channels  should  suspensions  and  dismissals  of  the  in- 
competent be  procured,  and  what  adequate  safeguards 
against  wrongful  and  partisan  removals  ought  a  city  charter 
to  provide?  What  practical  protection  may  a  city  obtain 
through  the  laws  and  ordinances  against  the  padding  of 
pay-rolls,  the  maintenance  of  sinecure  posts,  the  pernicious 
political  activity  of  employees,  and  the  other  kindred  sources 
of  waste  and  corruption  ?  How  should  officials  and  employ- 
ees who  have  grown  old  in  the  city's  service  be  taken  care 
of?  These  are  some  of  the  questions  that  every  city  must 
answer  satisfactorily  before  it  can  be  said  to  have  achieved 
any  approach  to  finality  in  the  solution  of  its  administrative 
problems. 

The  modern  city  is  a  very  large  employer  of  labor,  and  Number  of 
with  the  steady  extension  of  public  services  it  is  coming  to 
play  a  more  and  more  important  part  in  this  capacity.     If  Clties' 
one  adds  together  the  rank  and  file  of  the  police  and  fire 
departments,  the  teachers  and  other  officers  of  the  public 
schools,  the  officials  and  employees  of  the  street,  water, 

265 


266  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

sewerage,  parks,  and  various  other  departments,  one  finds 
that  the  total  number  included  within  the  category  of  those 
who  are  either  directly  or  indirectly  dependent  upon  wages 
from  the  municipal  treasury  is  larger  than  most  persons 
imagine.  In  New  York  the  number  is  about  65,000,  or 
nearly  eight  per  cent  of  the  registered  voting  population ; 
in  Boston  it  is  nearly  15,000,  or  about  twelve  per  cent  of  the 
number  of  names  on  the  voting-list.  When  it  is  further 
borne  in  mind  that  municipal  employees  are  proverbially 
active  in  politics  and  rarely  fail  to  vote,  it  will  appear  that 
their  actual  political  strength,  numerically  considered,  may 
not  unfairly  be  estimated  at  from  one-sixth  to  one-eighth 
of  the  whole  electorate.  Add  to  this  for  good  measure, 
moreover,  the  fact  that  they  always  have  relatives  and 
friends  whose  votes  they  greatly  influence.  This  massed 
political  strength,  direct  and  indirect,  gives  the  army  of 
officials  and  employees  what  virtually  constitutes  the  bal- 
ance of  power  in  most  of  the  larger  cities. 

Labor  and  Now,  the  task  of  getting  efficient  service  from  several 
thousand  employees  is  one  of  considerable  responsibility  and 
difficulty  in  even  the  best-organized  private  enterprise,  and 
makes  heavy  demands  upon  the  skill  of  those  who  have  the 
hiring  and  management  of  labor  in  ultimate  charge.  How 
much  greater,  then,  must  be  the  inherent  difficulty  in  a 
public  business  in  which  the  employees  are  also  shareholders, 
and  so  constitute  a  large  factor  in  selecting  those  who  de- 
termine the  conditions  of  their  employment !  It  is,  indeed, 
from  the  simple  fact  that  municipal  employees  are  voters 
and  friends  of  voters  that  some  of  the  city's  most  serious 
labor  troubles  arise.  As  voters,  the  employees  are  in  a  posi- 
tion to  reward  with  political  support  those  elective  officers 
of  city  government  who  bend  readily  to  their  demands  as 
employers.  As  voters,  likewise,  they  have  power  to  penalize 
with  their  political  opposition  those  who  stand  firm  against 


MUNICIPAL  OFFICIALS  AND   EMPLOYEES          267 

demands  for  higher  pay,  fewer  hours  of  labor,  frequent  holi- 
days, and  lenient  rules  of  discipline.  As  a  political  faction 
they  have  interests  that  are,  more  often  than  otherwise, 
diametrically  opposed  to  the  best  interests  of  the  taxpayers 
as  a  whole.  Yet  there  can  be  no  serious  thought  of  dis- 
franchising municipal  employees  because  as  a  class  they 
seek  first  at  the  polls  what  appears  to  be  their  own  personal 
welfare.  Were  the  policy  of  denying  the  franchise  to  all 
who  are  prone  to  use  it  selfishly  on  occasion  to  be  inaugu- 
rated, there  would  soon  be  very  few  names  on  the  voting- 
lists  of  some  cities.  In  their  attitude  toward  general  ques- 
tions of  municipal  policy,  the  men  on  the  city's  pay-roll  are 
no  more  apt  to  be  warped  by  personal  avarice  than  are  many 
other  elements  in  the  community.  The  chief  difference  is 
that  the  interests  of  the  latter,  not  being  matters  of  public 
record,  are  less  plainly  disclosed. 

It  has  now  come  to  be  well  recognized,  however,  that  How  the 
many  of  the  troubles  which  arise  from  the  ability  of  mu- 
nicipal  employees  to  put  political  pressure  upon  the  elective 
organs  of  the  city  can  be  greatly  lessened  by  improvements 
in  the  framework  and  the  administrative  mechanism  of  city 
government.  The  simplification  of  governing  apparatus 
by  the  substitution  of  a  small  one-chambered  council  for 
the  bicameral  system  now  in  vogue  in  many  cities,  the 
lengthening  of  the  mayor's  term  and  the  increase  in  the 
scope  of  his  appointing  power,  improved  methods  of  nomi- 
nation, the  short  ballot  without  party  designations,  —  these 
are  some  of  the  organic  changes  that  serve  to  diminish  the 
sinister  pressure  which  can  be  put  upon  the  elected  repre- 
sentatives of  the  people.  Businesslike  organization  of  the 
various  administrative  departments,  efficient  methods  of 
selecting  department  heads,  the  subdivision  of  work  within 
departments  so  that  each  official  shall  have  his  own  definite 
work  and  be  directly  responsible  for  it,  the  policy  of  appoint- 


268  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

ing  all  officials  (other  than  department  heads)  by  well-ordered 
competitive  tests,  due  protection  against  wrongful  removals, 
standing  rules  of  discipline  impartially  applied  to  all,  a 
system  of  superannuation  or  retiring  allowances  for  aged 
officials  and  employees,  —  these  are  some  of  the  purely  ad- 
ministrative changes  that  would  operate  to  the  same  end. 
Some  of  these  organic  changes  have  been  suggested  in  pre- 
vious chapters;  but,  to  secure  the  best  results,  most  cities 
must  make  a  good  many  intra-departmental  improvements 
as  well. 

The  theory  Given  a  proper  distribution  of  the  city's  business  among 
o?depart-1Ce  *ne  departments  as  already  outlined,1  there  must  still  be 
mental  provided  such  an  internal  organization  in  each  department 

orgamza-         *• 

tion.  as  will  insure  cordial   cooperation  among  its  various  divi- 

sions and  among  officials  in  the  same  division.  It  is  of 
course  true  that  in  most  cities  the  organization  of  each  ad- 
ministrative department  is  already  based  ostensibly  upon 
the  principle  of  making  all  responsibility  converge  in  the 
department  head.  The  deputy  head  of  a  division  or  bureau 
is  directly  under  the  orders  of  those  above  him,  and  he  in 
turn  gives  orders  to  those  within  his  control.  From  the 
head  of  the  department  to  the  minor  employees  there  almost 
always  appears,  at  least  on  paper,  a  hierarchy  of  responsi- 
bility. In  practice,  however,  this  chain  of  responsibility 
is  often  badly  broken.  Subordinates  who  have  political  or 
personal  influence  do  not  hesitate  to  put  their  reliance  upon 
the  support  of  men  above  their  own  immediate  chiefs ;  hence 
it  not  infrequently  happens  that  a  department  contains 
many  men  who  are  subordinates  only  in  name.  The  head 
of  the  department  knows  that  these  can  practically  set  him 
at  naught  by  going  over  his  head  to  the  mayor  or  the  coun- 
cil, if  occasion  demands.  By  the  reinstatement  of  officials 
who  have  been  discharged  for  good  reason,  the  transfer  of 
1  Above,  pp.  250-252. 


MUNICIPAL  OFFICIALS  AND   EMPLOYEES          269 

subordinates  from  strict  to  lenient  superiors,  the  granting 
of  requests  for  increased  remuneration  without  consultation 
with  department  heads,  —  these  are  but  a  few  of  the  ways 
in  which  officials  who  ostensibly  have  final  authority  in  such 
matters  find  themselves  overruled  from  above.  Political 
exigencies  and  a  desire  to  retain  their  positions  have  impelled 
many  department  heads  to  accept  this  situation  and  to  tol- 
erate its  continuance  year  after  year,  although  the  veriest 
tyro  in  the  municipal  service  knows  how  utterly  demoralizing 
it  is  to  the  maintenance  of  discipline  in  the  ranks. 

Carrying  the  process  a  step  farther,  one  finds  the  same  Thepoiiti- 
independence  of  immediate  authority  among  the  minor  of  employ^* 
employees.  Not  as  individuals  can  these  ordinary  em-  ees- 
ployees  venture  successfully  to  defy  the  orders  of  their  offi- 
cial superiors,  but  as  groups  they  can,  and  frequently  do. 
Rarely  is  the  issue  between  official  and  employees  raised  in 
such  a  way  as  to  touch  only  one  or  two  of  the  latter.  Al- 
most invariably  employees  are  affected  as  a  class,  or  they 
think  they  are.  In  such  cases,  despite  the  theory  that  the 
department  head  is  responsible  for  the  settlement  of  mooted 
questions  within  his  own  field,  an  appeal  can  almost  always 
be  taken  to  the  mayor  or  to  the  city  council.  The  coun- 
cilmen,  approaching  the  matter  in  the  light  of  the  effect 
which  a  decision  is  likely  to  have  on  their  own  political 
fortunes,  are  naturally  disposed  to  grant  demands  made  by 
bodies  of  employees,  even  when  such  action  involves  a  direct 
rebuff  to  the  officials  immediately  concerned.  Differences 
between  employer  and  employees  necessarily  arise  in  public, 
as  in  private,  management ;  but  concessions  to  the  wage- 
earner  are  much  more  easily  wrested  in  the  public  service. 
City  employees  are  well  aware  of  the  political  influence  which 
they  can  exert,  and  they  rarely  fail  to  make  it  do  full  duty. 
To  render  it  the  more  effective,  the  employees  of  various  mu- 
nicipal departments  in  the  larger  cities  have  organized  them- 


270 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Inferior 
quality  of 
municipal 
labor. 


selves  into  associations  which  are  to  all  intents  and  purposes 
labor  unions,  although  they  do  not  bear  the  name  and  are 
not  usually  affiliated  with  the  regular  labor  federations. 
Often  they  take  the  guise  of  benefit  associations,  or  even 
of  social  clubs  maintaining  benefit  funds  and  club-rooms. 
The  money  needed  to  carry  on  these  organizations  is  in 
part  secured  by  the  levy  of  assessments  upon  members,  but 
generally,  in  larger  part,  by  the  holding  of  a  policemen's 
ball,  or  a  firemen's  tournament,  or  some  similar  money-mak- 
ing affair  in  social  guise.  Such  functions  are  made  the  occa- 
sion of  a  general  levy  upon  the  public  through  the  sale  of 
tickets  by  policemen,  firemen,  and  others  to  persons  whom 
they  are  supposed  to  serve  and  protect.  The  whole  prac- 
tice is  a  trivial,  but  none  the  less  reprehensible,  form  of  petty 
blackmail.  Fraternal  or  social  in  outward  appearance,  these 
organizations  are  for  the  most  part  nothing  but  machines 
for  putting  political  pressure  where  it  will  avail  most  in  the 
interest  of  members.  Thus  does  the  public,  as  usual,  pay 
its  way  both  coming  and  going.  The  taxpayers  of  cities 
yield  the  contributions  which  in  their  turn  give  the  employ- 
ees of  the  city  added  strength  in  pressing  their  frequent  de- 
mands for  new  concessions  at  the  public  expense. 

But  while  the  absence  of  businesslike  adjustment  among 
departments,  and  the  presence  of  friction,  insubordination, 
and  political  pressure  within  individual  departments  them- 
selves, have  all  militated  against  efficiency  in  the  municipal 
service,  a  much  greater  obstacle  to  satisfactory  results  is 
to  be  found  in  the  quality  of  the  labor,  skilled  and  unskilled, 
which  usually  gains  a  place  on  the  city's  pay-roll.  In  the 
absence  of  strict  rules  relating  to  the  selection  of  officials 
and  employees  by  competitive  tests,  appointments  to  all 
places  in  the  administrative  service  of  the  city  are  almost 
certain  to  be  regarded  as  the  legitimate  patronage  of  the 
party  in  power.  Save  in  the  case  of  purely  technical  posi- 


MUNICIPAL   OFFICIALS  AND   EMPLOYEES  271 

tions,  little  heed  is  paid  to  the  personal  qualifications  of 
individual  applicants  for  vacant  positions.  The  practice 
of  advertising  for  applications,  so  common  in  the  cities  of 
Europe,  is  almost  unknown  in  America.  As  soon  as  a  mu- 
nicipal job  becomes  vacant,  a  host  of  aspirants,  each  backed 
by  his  friends,  come  forward  to  press  their  claims  upon  the 
mayor  or  the  council  or  the  head  of  the  department,  —  not 
claims  based  upon  special  fitness  or  administrative  experi- 
ence, however,  for  most  of  the  applicants  possess  none  of 
these,  but  claims  to  reward  for  party  service  and  professions 
of  future  political  value  to  the  administration.  Thus  the 
administrative  service  of  most  cities  becomes  clogged  with 
men  who  have  failed  to  make  any  headway  in  private  vo- 
cations, and  who  certainly  can  do  no  better  in  the  lax  dis- 
ciplinary environment  of  public  office-holding.  Men  of 
the  most  mediocre  attainments  in  engineering,  law,  account- 
ing, and  other  professions,  almost  everywhere  succeed  in 
putting  themselves  into  municipal  posts  of  large  respon- 
sibility for  which  the  highest  grades  of  professional  skill 
would  be  none  too  good.  Times  without  number  the  tax- 
payers of  American  cities  have  been  mulcted  heavily  through 
the  failure  of  administrative  officials  to  display  even  ordi- 
nary skill  and  intelligence  in  the  handling  of  important 
matters  intrusted  to  them. 

In  large  cities  the  head  of  a  department  cannot  give  close  The  city's 

,  .   .  ,.  .  .,,  .       ,  .       .       .     ,.    ,.  dependence 

personal  supervision  to  everything  within  his  jurisdiction.  up0n  su 
That  would  be  a  physical  impossibility.     For  the  decision  dinates- 
of  many  questions  he  must  depend  upon  the  judgment  of  his 
subordinates,  each  of  whom  is  supposed  to  have  special  skill 
and  knowledge  in  his  own  branch  of  work.     Thus,  the  legal 
advice  which  is  tendered  to  the  mayor  and  council  in  the 
name  and  on  the  formal  responsibility  of  the  corporation 
counsel  or  the  city  solicitor  is  in  most  cases  based  upon  an  ex- 
amination of  statutes,  ordinances,  or  precedents  made  by  the 


272 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Municipal 
and  private 
labor  effi- 
ciency con- 
trasted. 


assistant  solicitor  or  by  others  in  his  office.  It  is  upon  the 
diligence  and  intelligence  of  these  latter,  accordingly,  that 
the  legality  or  illegality  of  whatever  action  the  city  may 
take  on  many  matters  will  largely  depend.  So  in  the  de- 
partment of  public  works.  Specifications  and  contracts 
must  usually  have  the  approval  of  the  department  head ; 
but  the  actual  work  of  drafting  them  is  intrusted  to  some 
subordinate,  commonly  an  engineer,  who  submits  his  drafts 
to  the  law  department  for  its  approval.  After  they  are  put 
into  preliminary  shape,  these  documents  seem  rarely  to 
obtain  more  than  a  perfunctory  scrutiny  from  any  higher 
authority;  so  that  the  interests  of  the  city  have  in  reality 
been  intrusted  entirely  to  subordinates.  Other  departments 
of  the  city's  service  furnish  similar  examples.  Professional 
skill  and  expertness  are  thus  even  more  imperative  for  the 
men  who  do  the  preliminary  work,  than  for  department  heads 
who  carry  the  technical  responsibility.  Yet  these  are  the 
branches  of  the  city's  service  where  professional  expertness 
is  least  often  found. 

Rank  for  rank,  the  municipal  departments  compare  un- 
favorably with  private  business  organizations  in  the  quality 
of  the  work  performed  by  their  respective  staffs.  For  the 
same  salary  the  city  almost  invariably  procures  skill  of  an 
inferior  grade  and  diligence  of  inferior  degree.  That  is  why, 
in  its  dealings  with  private  corporations  and  even  with  in- 
dividuals, the  municipality  has  usually  found  itself  saddled 
with  the  short  end  of  the  bargain.  It  is  outmatched  in 
skill,  intelligence,  tact,  and  loyalty.  To  offset  this  handicap, 
for  which  the  city  has  only  itself  to  blame,  municipal  offi- 
cers frequently  resort  to  unfairness  in  dealing  with  private 
concerns.  They  are  very  apt  to  ignore  the  principle  that 
parties  to  an  agreement  are  to  be  deemed  equal  and  are 
entitled  to  equal  consideration.  The  city,  in  its  agree- 
ments with  public-service  corporations  or  contractors,  often 


MUNICIPAL   OFFICIALS  AND   EMPLOYEES  273 

endeavors  at  all  points  to  secure  terms  that  put  the  latter 
completely  at  the  mercy  of  its  own  officials,  a  precaution 
which  is  thought  to  be  prudent  in  that  it  permits  errors  to 
be  set  right  later  without  any  mulcting  of  the  municipality 
for  the  incapacity  of  its  own  agents.  City  engineers,  for 
example,  have  acquired  the  habit  of  stipulating  that  they 
shall  themselves  decide  all  points  of  dispute  arising  between 
the  municipality  and  contractors.1  The  result  is  that  all 
those  who  deal  with  the  city  take  into  account  the  fact  that 
they  must  perform  their  agreements  according  to  interpreta- 
tions put  upon  them  by  officials  whose  positions  preclude 
impartiality.  Accordingly,  they  either  lay  plans  to  control 
the  officials  to  whom  the  right  of  deciding  disputes  has  been 
allotted  by  the  terms  of  city  contracts,  or,  when  such  officers 
cannot  be  influenced  in  their  favor,  they  include  in  their 
estimates  of  cost  an  allowance  for  adverse  decisions.  In 
either  case  the  city  pays  heavily.  The  wh6le  thing  runs  in 
a  curious  circle.  Officials  in  the  city  departments  who  are 
appointed  to  pay  partisan  debts  or  to  secure  political  ad- 
vantage are  rarely  endowed  with  the  intelligence,  skill, 
industry,  and  experience  necessary  to  perform  properly  the 
tasks  intrusted  to  them.  Realizing  this,  they  manage  to 
shift  the  responsibility  for  inevitable  mishaps  upon  the 
shoulders  of  contractors,  public-service  corporations,  or 
others  who  have  dealings  with  the  municipality.  As  these 
can  shift  it  no  farther,  they  take  it  aboard  and  charge  the 
city  with  the  cost  of  carrying  what  ought  to  have  been  borne 
by  its  own  officials. 

1  "This  is  usually  done  under  the  pretext,  on  the  part  of  the  municipal- 
ity, that  its  interests  must  be  protected  in  every  practicable  way  from  the 
possibility  of  miscarriage  or  loss  in  dealing  with  the  contractor.  Con- 
tracts for  public  work  are  often  thus  notoriously  one-sided,  and  attempt  to 
place  the  contractor  entirely  in  the  power  of  the  municipality.  Take  up 
almost  any  such  contract  and  every  page  bristles  with  clauses  intended  to 
secure  to  the  municipality  rights  that  are  denied  the  contractor.'!  —  SAM- 
UEL WHINEBY,  Municipal  Public  Works  (New  York,  1903),  73. 


274  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

The  cost  of  Now,  the  entire  cost  of  this  official  incompetency  which  is 
tence!1*  so  cleverly  shielded  from  the  public  wrath  by  a  persistent 
evasion  of  responsibility  is  something  that  can  be  neither 
accurately  estimated  nor  adequately  described.  One  of 
the  best  municipal  accountants  in  the  United  States  has 
endeavored  to  figure  up,  in  a  general  way,  the  proportion 
of  New  York's  municipal  income  that  is  annually  wasted 
through  official  incapacity  and  inattention  to  duty.  He 
estimates  that  in  the  pay-roll  alone  $12,000,000  is  about  the 
price  paid  annually  by  the  metropolis  for  collusion,  in- 
efficiency, and  idleness  in  the  various  municipal  departments.1 
Nor  does  this  represent  even  the  greater  part  of  the  entire 
waste.  The  city  of  New  York  spends  each  year  about 
$15,000,000  for  supplies  and  materials ;  but,  though  it  buys 
in  very  large  quantities,  it  has  received,  as  a  rule,  neither 
wholesale  rates  nor  cash  discounts.  In  considerable  measure 
this  is  due  to  a  lack  of  proper  purchasing  methods,  but 
in  larger  degree  it  results  from  the  total  failure  of  the  city 
to  secure  the  type  of  servant  who  will  guard  the  financial 
interests  of  his  master  as  his  own. 

Most  of  the  Unquestionably,  the  root  of  this  trouble  lies  in  the  manner 
f rorn  Inferior  °f  selecting  most  of  those  who  are  taken  into  the  service  of 
•election01  *^e  various  municipal  departments,  and  the  remedy  can 
accordingly  be  found  in  a  radical  alteration  of  these  methods. 
The  appointment  of  subordinate  officials,  whether  by  the 
mayor  or  by  the  council  or  by  the  heads  of  departments  at 
their  entire  discretion,  results  almost  invariably,  and  in- 
deed, one  may  say,  almost  inevitably,  in  the  purely  partisan 
selection  of  men  who  have  no  tangible  qualifications  for  the 
work  which  they  are  expected  to  do.  The  experience  of 
American  cities  on  this  point  has  been  far  too  extensive  to 
leave  any  doubt  in  the  matter ;  no  other  maxim  of  municipal 

1  F.  A.  Cleveland,  Municipal  Administration  and  Accounting   (New 
York,  1909),  2&-29. 


MUNICIPAL  OFFICIALS  AND  EMPLOYEES          275 

science  can  draw  more  evidence  to  its  support.  Since,  then, 
entire  discretion  in  the  matter  of  selecting  officials  has  al- 
most always  been  abused  when  given  to  these  authorities,  The  remedy, 
there  seems  to  be  no  satisfactory  alternative  other  than  to 
take  the  discretion  away.  To  do  so  is  not  in  any  way  to  im- 
pair the  full  responsibility  either  of  the  elective  branches  of 
the  city  government  or  of  the  department  heads.  Subordi- 
nate officials  are  not  policy-determining  factors.  Their 
work  lies  within  the  plans  mapped  out  for  them  by  others. 
Skill  and  diligence  in  carrying  out  their  instructions  are  the 
chief  qualities  demanded  of  them.  The  broader  adminis- 
trative qualifications  so  desirable  in  heads  of  departments 
are  not  essential  in  the  case  of  their  subordinates.  Hence 
it  is  that  practically  all  municipal  administrative  posts 
other  than  headships  of  departments  may  very  properly, 
and,  as  experience  proves,  may  with  excellent  results,  be 
filled  by  men  who  have  been  selected  through  the  agency 
of  some  competitive  test. 

This  system  of  appointment  by  competitive  test  is  in  its  The  merit 
broader  application  commonly  known  as  the  civil-service  appoint? 
examination.     First  tried  in  the  national  administration,  men**° 

7    mumcipMl 

which  derived  it  from  England,  this  method  of  selecting  posts, 
administrative  officials  has  made  its  way  into  several  of 
the  states,  and  finally  into  a  number  of  cities.1  At  present 
it  is  the  method  of  choosing  a  considerable  proportion  of 
the  officials  in  all  the  cities  of  New  York,  Ohio,  and  Massa- 
chusetts, and  in  certain  cities  of  Pennsylvania ;  it  has  also 
been  adopted  for  the  selection  of  officials  in  the  police  and 
fire  departments  of  various  municipalities  in  Wisconsin  and 
Illinois.  In  a  good  many  others,  chiefly  those  which  have 

1  On  the  history  of  the  system  before  its  appearance  in  America,  see 
D.  B.  Eaton,  Civil  Service  in  Great  Britain  (New  York,  1880).  The  his- 
tory of  the  system  in  the  United  States  is  traced  by  C.  B.  Fish,  Civil 
Service  and  the  Patronage  (New  York,  1905). 


276  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

adopted  the  commission  plan  of  government,  it  has  been  ap- 
plied to  subordinate  posts  in  all  or  most  of  the  municipal  de- 
partments ;  and  the  same  is  true  of  cities  like  Seattle,  San 
Francisco,  New  Haven,  Los  Angeles,  Kansas  City,  Memphis, 
and  Detroit,  which  have  in  recent  years  adopted  charters 
of  other  types.1  During  the  last  decade  the  extension  of 
the  competitive  system  has  been  rapid,  and  there  is  every 
reason  to  expect,  from  the  present  trend  of  public  opinion, 
that  its  spread  in  the  next  few  years  will  be  at  an  even 
greater  pace.2 
The  aims  of  Stated  briefly,  the  purposes  of  a  well-ordered  civil-service 

a  civil-ser- 
vice system,   system  are  both  preventive  and  positive.     In  the  first  place, 

it  is  a  system  which  aims  to  prevent  those  who  have  authority 
to  appoint  municipal  officials  from  using  this  authority  to  pay 
political  debts.  It  aims  to  remove  from  the  category  of  par- 
tisan spoils  the  administrative  offices  of  the  city.  In  the 
second  place,  it  seeks  to  provide  an  agency  whereby  properly 
qualified  officials  can  be  secured  for  these  posts  whenever  they 
are  wanted.  This  it  does  by  establishing  and  conducting, 
periodically,  open  competitions  designed  to  test  the  qualifi- 
cations of  all  who  apply.  These  competitions,  besides  being 
open,  under  certain  reasonable  limitations,  to  all  who  wish 
to  enter,  are  advertised  beforehand  and  are  conducted 
publicly  with  all  necessary  safeguards  for  honesty  and  fair- 
ness. The  tests,  whether  mental,  physical,  or  both,  are 
adapted  to  the  duties  of  the  office  which  is  to  be  filled.  The 
system  rests,  in  a  word,  upon  three  propositions,  —  namely, 
that  every  administrative  office  demands  certain  qualifica- 
tions, that  the  office  should  go  to  him  who  is  best  fitted  to 
fill  it,  and  that  the  fairest  way  to  discover  such  individual 

1  The  complete  list  may  be  found  each  year  in  the  Proceedings  of  the 
National  Civil  Service  Reform  League. 

2  On  the  constitutionality  of  civil-service  laws,  see  J.  F.  Dillon,  Law  of 
Municipal  Corporations,  I.   §  397. 


MUNICIPAL   OFFICIALS  AND   EMPLOYEES  277 

is  to  establish  an  open  competition.  The  chief  function 
of  those  who  have  the  civil-service  system  in  charge  is,  ac- 
cordingly, to  arrange  the  details  of  the  competition  and  to 
see  that  it  is  conducted  fairly. 

It  becomes  of  great  importance,  therefore,  that  the  author-  Methods  of 
ities  in  charge  of  the  system  shall  be  free  from  the  influence  ciSi-sScf 
of  political  pressure  in  the  interest  of  candidates  for  office.  commis- 

f  r  sions. 

Three  methods  of  appointing  such  authorities  are  in  vogue. 
In  some  cities,  as,  for  example,  in  Philadelphia  and  in 
Chicago,  the  administration  of  the  system  is  in  charge  of 
a  civil-service  commission  appointed  by  the  mayor.1  This 
is  a  plan  which,  though  it  exists  in  many  cities,  has  little 
or  no  justification  either  in  principle  or  in  practice.  In 
principle  it  is  anomalous  that  a  mayor  should  have  the 
appointment  and  removal  of  those  whose  chief  function  is 
to  keep  patronage  from  his  own  grasp.  In  practice  it  has  i.  The 
been  found  that  a  civil-service  commission  appointed  by  the  ^^itn 
mayor  is  little  more  than  a  tractable  instrument  for  digni- 
fying political  patronage  with  the  stamp  of  reform.  With 
the  right  sort  of  mayor  in  office  such  a  commission  will  be 
allowed  to  perform  its  functions  fairly  and  well ;  with  the 
wrong  sort  of  mayor  it  can  rarely  keep  itself  intact  except 
by  a  supine  obedience  to  the  orders  that  come  from  the  city 
hall.  In  other  words,  it  is  least  effective  when  it  is  most 
needed. 

A  second  method,  pursued  in  the  forty-eight  cities  of  New  2.  The  New 
York  State,  is  to  have  the  civil-service  commission  in  each 
municipality  appointed  by  the  mayor,  but  to  provide  that 

1  The  Philadelphia  commission  consists  of  three  members  appointed  by 
the  mayor  for  a  term  of  five  years,  not  more  than  two  of  them  to  be  from 
the  same  political  party  (Laws  of  Pennsylvania,  1906,  pp.  83-84).  In 
Chicago  there  are  three  commissioners  appointed  by  the  mayor  for  a  three- 
year  term,  one  retiring  annually  (Revised  Statutes  of  Illinois,  ch.  24).  In 
New  Orleans  the  civil-service  commission  is  made  up  of  the  mayor,  the 
comptroller,  and  the  city  treasurer  ex  officio,  together  with  two  members 
appointed  by  the  mayor  (Laws  of  Louisiana,  1900,  p.  140). 


278  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

these  municipal  boards  shall  do  their  work  subject  to  the 
supervision  of  a  state  civil-service  commission  appointed  by 
the  governor.  This  latter  body  has  authority  to  remove, 
when  necessary,  any  members  of  municipal  civil-service 
commissions  who  prove  remiss  in  the  performance  of  their 
duties,  and  to  appoint  the  successors  of  those  who  may  be  so 
removed.  The  New  York  plan  aims  to  combine  local  admin- 
istration of  the  civil-service  system  with  such  central  super- 
vision as  is  necessary  to  prevent  abuses ;  and  as  a  general 
principle  of  popular  government  this  policy  is  sound  enough. 
More  emphasis,  however,  has  been  laid  upon  the  local  than 
upon  the  central  features  of  the  system,  with  the  result  that 
state  supervision  has  not  been  sufficiently  comprehensive 
or  strict  to  prevent  a  lax  administration  of  the  civil-service 
rules  in  the  interest  of  those  who  have  purely  political  ends  to 
serve.  Undue  leniency  toward  evasions  of  the  law  by  local 
commissions  has  greatly  impaired  the  safeguards  which  the 
system  potentially  offers  in  every  city  of  the  state. 
3.  The  The  third  plan  is  that  which  has  been  in  operation  since 

8eUsSpian."  1884  in  the  cities  of  Massachusetts.  The  thirty- three  cities 
of  this  state  have  no  municipal  civil-service  commissions,  but 
come  directly  under  the  jurisdiction  of  a  state  board  made 
up  of  three  members  appointed  by  the  governor.  This  central 
commission  prescribes  the  tests,  conducts  them,  and  certifies 
the  results  to  the  cities.  When  any  municipal  post  within  the 
classified  service  is  to  be  filled  by  appointment,  the  state 
commission  is  asked  by  the  city  authorities  to  send  down  the 
names  of  those  who  have  stood  highest  at  the  tests.  If  there 
are  none  who  have  already  qualified,  a  competition  is  an- 
nounced and  candidates  are  called  for.  It  will,  of  course,  be 
urged  that  this  system  is  an  infringement  upon  the  principle 
of  municipal  home  rule,  and  it  doubtless  is  so  if  by  municipal 
autonomy  one  implies  a  denial  of  the  state's  right  to  secure 
the  impartial  enforcement  of  its  own  laws.  But  whatever 


MUNICIPAL  OFFICIALS   AND   EMPLOYEES          279 

affront  it  may  give  to  the  shibboleths  of  politicians,  the 
Massachusetts  system  does  possess,  in  actual  operation,  the 
substantial  merit  of  being  effective.  It  removes  the  adminis-  its  merits, 
tration  of  the  civil-service  system  from  the  influence  of  local 
politics,  for  neither  directly  nor  indirectly  can  the  appointing 
officers  of  cities  bring  sinister  pressure  to  bear  on  the  state 
commission.1  It  is  economical,  in  that  it  prevents  that  du- 
plication of  local  and  central  effort  which  characterizes  the 
administration  of  the  system  in  New  York.  As  might  be 
expected,  the  professional  politicians  of  Massachusetts  pro- 
claim perennially  that  the  whole  system  is  "undemocratic"  ; 
and  they  are  perhaps  consistent  in  raising  this  cry,  for 
their  definition  of  democracy  asserts  that  all  men  are  equal, 
and  any  form  of  fair  competition  is  sure  to  prove  that  some 
men  are  inferior. 

Where,  as  in  Massachusetts,  the  merit  system  has  been  Results  of 
put  to  fair  trial,  with  its  administration  intrusted  to  men 
who  have  both  the  will  and  the  power  to  perform  their  func- 
tions without  fear  or  favor,  there  is  no  serious  question  as  to 
its  substantial  achievements.  To  obtain  tangible  proofs 
of  this,  one  need  only  compare  the  personnel  and  work  of 
those  municipal  departments  which  are  under  civil-service 
regulations  with  those  which  are  not.  The  results  of  such 
comparisons,  wherever  they  have  been  made,  are  so  decisively 
in  favor  of  the  former  method  as  to  leave  no  doubt  that  the 
merit  system  is  one  of  the  most  dependable  of  all  the  agencies 
that  help  the  city  to  get  a  day's  work  for  a  day's  pay. 
Comparison  between  the  efficiency  of  the  same  department 
before  and  after  being  put  under  merit-system  rules  leads  to 

1  It  is,  of  course,  not  at  all  certain  that  this  would,  in  other  jurisdictions 
be  the  result  of  intrusting  the  administration  of  the  merit  system  to  state- 
appointed  authorities.  The  outcome  in  Massachusetts  is  largely  due  to 
local  causes,  particularly  to  the  fact  that  the  governors  of  the  common- 
wealth have  maintained  good  traditions  in  the  matter  of  state  appoint- 
ments. 


280 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Objections 


service  re- 


i.  Tests 


exactly  the  same  conclusion.  Such  comparisons  are,  to  be 
sure,  not  always  easy  to  make,  for  the  reason  that  the  intro- 
duction of  civil-service  regulations  is  often  accompanied  by  a 
change  in  the  general  structure  of  city  government,  or  by  a 
reorganization  of  administrative  departments.  In  either  of 
these  events  it  becomes  nearly  impossible  to  tell  how  much 
improvement  is  due  to  one  or  other  of  the  various  changes 
made.  But  the  instances  in  which  the  merit  system  has 
been  put  into  operation  without  other  organic  changes  are 
sufficiently  numerous  to  warrant  the  conviction  that,  even 
of  itself,  the  plan  can  be  made  the  agency  of  marked  im- 
provement.1 

Various  objections  have  been  urged  against  the  extension 
°f  ^e  civil-service  system  to  all  city  officials  and  employees 
other  than  heads  of  departments.  Some  of  these  objections 
rest  upon  misunderstandings  as  to  the  way  in  which  the 
system  is  administered;  others  arise  from  the  occasional 
failure  of  civil-service  authorities  to  apply  their  rules  with 
either  judgment  or  tact  ;  and  others,  again,  are  objections  of 
more  or  less  validity,  which  apply  not  only  to  civil-service 
tests,  but  to  all  methods  of  selection  based  upon  open  com- 
petition. 

In  the  first  place,  the  system  of  civil-service  appointments 
to  posts  in  the  municipal  service  seems  to  be  inseparably  as- 
sociated in  the  public  mind  with  the  idea  of  written  examina- 
tions designed  to  test  solely  the  intellectual  qualities  of 
candidates,  and  conducted  in  academic  fashion.  For  the 
propagation  of  this  popular  notion  civil-service  examiners 
have  to  a  considerable  extent  been  responsible.  In  the  earlier 
days  of  civil-service  reform,  and  indeed  even  yet  in  many 
jurisdictions,  the  tests  applied  have  been  too  narrow.  They 
have  laid  too  much  stress  upon  examinations  in  elementary 


1  For  example,  see  the  summary  of  results  in  Kansas  City,  in  American 
Political  Science  Review,  VI.  91  (February,  1912). 


MUNICIPAL   OFFICIALS  AND   EMPLOYEES  281 

composition,  arithmetic,  and  history,  and  too  little  upon  those 
that  relate  directly  to  the  work  which  the  official  will  have  to 
perform.  Those  of  us  who  have  much  to  do  with  academic 
examinations,  in  the  way  both  of  selecting  questions  and  of 
reading  answers,  are  all  too  well  aware  of  the  fact  that  such 
tests  afford  at  best  a  very  inadequate  and  undependable 
means  whereby  to  gauge  the  real  quality  of  a  young  man's 
mind  or  even  to  measure  the  extent  of  his  information.  Civil- 
service  authorities  at  the  outset  put  too  much  faith  in  con- 
clusions deduced  from  formal  written  tests  upon  matters 
which  are  supposed  to  be  part  of  an  elementary  education. 
By  so  doing  they  brought  upon  the  whole  system  much 
criticism  that  might  easily  have  been  avoided. 

But  civil-service  tests  are  not  now  wholly  of  this  nature,  The  objec- 
and  not  even  largely  so  when  the  system  is  prudently  admin- 


istered.1    Physical  examinations,  tests  designed  to  uncover  wh®n  th.e 

J  system  is 

a  candidate's  knowledge  of  the  specific  duties  which  he  will  wisely 

adminis- 

be  called  upon  to  perform,  questions  framed  to  display  his  tered. 
soundness  of  judgment  and  powers  of  initiative,  require- 
ments that  candidates  shall  present  testimonials  fr.om  former 
employers,  —  all   these   things   form   essential   features    of 
competitions  that  are  wisely  managed.     When  the  office  to 
be  filled  is  technical  or  specialized  in  its  duties  (as  the 
post   of  draughtsman,  analyst,  milk  inspector,  ambulance 
surgeon,  or  bookkeeper),  the  planning  and  application  of 
appropriate  tests  present  no  very  difficult  problems.    But 
when  the  duties  attaching  to  the  office  are  of  a  non-technical 
or  general  nature,  for  which  an  applicant  cannot  ordinarily  Difficulties 
equip  himself  by  any  form  of  professional  training,  the  per-  testing 
plexities  become  much  greater  ;  and  it  is,  unfortunately,  into  *uaiifica- 

tions. 
1  Some  excellent  specimens  of  the  right  type  of  civil-service  examina- 

tion questions  may  be  found  in  the  Civil  Service  Text  Book  (1910-1911), 
issued  by  the  city  of  Chicago.  As  stated  in  the  preface,  one  of  the  reasons 
for  publishing  this  book  was  "to  dispel  the  mistaken  idea  that  examina- 
tions consist  of  academic  tests." 


282  GOVERNMENT    OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

this  latter  category  that  most  subordinate  municipal  positions 
happen  to  fall.  Take,  for  example,  the  post  of  patrolman. 
Its  duties  cannot  be  learned  through  any  of  the  ordinary 
channels  of  instruction  or  apprenticeship,  and  the  qualities 
that  insure  the  satisfactory  performance  of  these  duties  are 
much  easier  to  define  than  to  discover.  Personal  courage, 
integrity,  tactfulness,  and  a  level  head  as  well  as  intelligence 
seem  to  be  the  essential  qualities  of  an  efficient  police  officer ; 
they  are  obviously  more  important  than  proficiency  in  pen- 
manship, geography,  or  arithmetic.  A  rigid  physical  ex- 
amination is  a  great  help  to  the  examiners,  for  it  is  almost 
a  truism  that  bodily  vigor  goes  with  a  clean  mind  and 
good  morals.  Yet  it  can  hardly  be  urged  that  any  series 
of  formal  tests  will  disclose  with  certainty  the  particular 
candidates  who  possess  these  important  qualities  in  the 
highest  degree.  In  spite  of  all  this,  however,  the  civil- 
service  authorities  of  some  cities  have  been  remarkably 
successful  in  adapting  the  tests  to  the  ends  in  view.1  When 
the  qualifications  desired  of  an  appointee  can  be  clearly  as- 
certained and  sufficient  study  can  be  given  to  the  planning  of 
the  tests,  the  examination  can  be  made  to  serve,  not  perhaps 
as  an  unfailing  means  of  choosing  the  best  qualified  among 
a  list  of  candidates,  but  as  a  tolerably  safe  method  of  selec- 
tion.2 Even  at  its  worst  it  is  superior  in  this  respect  to  the 
spoils  system  at  its  best. 


1  This  is  frequently  done  by  calling  to  the  assistance  of  the  regular 
examining  authorities  outside  experts,  who  help  to  plan  the  competition, 
select  the  tests,  and  pass  judgment  on  the  results.  This  procedure  has 
been  frequently  used,  during  recent  years,  in  New  York,  Chicago,  Boston, 
Kansas  City,  and  elsewhere. 

*  For  the  selection  of  ordinary  unskilled  labor  no  formal  tests  are  com- 
monly used.  The  usual  plan  is  to  provide  a  waiting-list,  upon  which  are 
enrolled  the  names  of  all  those  who  are  seeking  places  in  the  city's  labor 
force.  Men  are  certified  from  this  list  in  order  of  their  application,  pref- 
erence being  usually  given  to  veterans  of  the  Civil  War  and  to  those  who 
have  families  depending  upon  them  for  support.  It  would  seem  as  if  a 


MUNICIPAL  OFFICIALS  AND   EMPLOYEES          283 

No  method  of  appointment  will  ever  prove  to  be  an 
automatic  winnower  of  the  chaff  from  the  wheat  among 
aspirants  to  posts  in  municipal  departments.  Guiding 
hands  there  must  be,  and  when  these  are  controlled  by 
the  spirit  and  ideals  of  a  martinet  no  system  can  make  very 
rapid  headway  to  a  hold  upon  the  public  confidence.  The 
principles  of  civil-service  reform,  thoroughly  sound  in  them- 
selves, have  sometimes  been  put  into  operation  under  the 
guidance  of  men  whose  narrowness  of  vision  precluded  the 
adoption  of  other  than  rule-of-thumb  tests,  poorly  devised, 
ill-adapted  to  the  occasion,  and  calculated  to  impair  public 
faith  in  the  merit  system  as  a  whole.  Since  these  short- 
comings are  incidental,  however,  and  not  inherent,  they  may 
usually  be  remedied  by  the  exercise  of  a  little  patience.  Year 
by  year  the  methods  of  examination  have  improved ;  more 
stress  has  been  laid  upon  the  previous  training  and  ex- 
perience of  candidates ;  the  past  records  of  all  applicants 
are  nowadays  carefully  investigated ;  indeed  the  whole  sys- 
tem is  being  vastly  better  administered  to-day  than  it  was 
a  decade  or  two  ago. 

In  the  second  place,  it  is  frequently  urged  that  the  system  2.  Tests 
of  civil-service  appointment  should  not  be  applied  to  officials  beljpiied 
in  certain  city  departments  who  hold  what  may  be  termed  t°°ffi.cial8m 

J          *  J  certain 

positions  of  financial  trust  and  for  whose  integrity  the  head  financial  de- 
partments. 
of  the  department  is  laid  under  personal  bonds.     Within  this 

class  come  the  employees  in  the  office  of  the  city  collector  or 
the  city  treasurer.  Being  personally  responsible  for  the  hon- 
esty of  these  officials,  the  head  of  the  department  should  have 
a  free  hand,  it  is  claimed,  in  selecting  them.  This,  however, 

physical  examination  of  at  least  moderate  stringency  might  be  generally 
applied  in  the  case  of  applicants  for  positions  as  ordinary  laborers,  especially 
since  much  of  the  city's  difficulty  in  getting  work  done  at  fair  cost  results 
from  the  fact  that  too  many  laborers  are  physically  unable  to  do  the  hard 
work  required  of  them.  Such  tests  have  been  used  for  some  years  in 
Massachusetts  with  good  results. 


284  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

is  a  doctrine  difficult  to  sustain  on  any  rational  ground.  All 
heads  of  departments  are,  in  a  sense,  personally  responsible 
for  the  negligence  or  the  dishonesty  of  their  employees.  Some 
of  them  may  suffer  in  reputation  rather  than  in  purse  when 
inefficiency  or  dishonesty  is  disclosed;  but  that  difference 
scarcely  warrants  the  application  of  an  exceptional  method 
of  appointment  for  positions  of  financial  trust.  Besides, 
there  is  nothing  to  prevent  a  city,  if  it  so  desires,  from 
putting  the  subordinate  officials  of  a  collecting  or  a  treasury 
department  under  individual  bonds.  It  would  cost  some- 
thing to  do  that,  but  in  the  end  it  would  be  far  more  eco- 
nomical than  to  tolerate  political  interference  in  these 
departments.  Moreover,  the  exemption  of  one  or  two  de- 
partments from  civil-service  rules  almost  invariably  makes 
these  offices  the  dumping-ground  for  inefficients  who,  for 
personal  or  political  reasons,  must  be  provided  with  places 
on  the  city's  pay-roll.  Exempted  departments  are  usually 
the  most  overmanned,  the  most  expensive,  and  the  least 
satisfactory  in  the  whole  municipal  service. 
3.  inflex-  Other  objections  commonly  encountered  are  to  the  effect 

ible  nature      ,••  .    M  .  ,  •, 

of  the  ays-     *nat  civil-service  commissions  are  prone  to  be  so  overzealous 
tem-  in  hewing  to  the  letter  and  disregarding  the  spirit  of  the 

laws  which  they  administer  that  in  some  instances  they  vir- 
tually dictate  the  allocation  of  duties  within  a  department, 
by  insisting  that  persons  certified  for  appointment  to  definite 
posts  shall  perform  the  duties  of  those  posts  only  and  not 
even  incidentally  have  anything  to  do  with  the  work  of  any 
others ;  that  the  system  encourages  a  bureaucratic  attitude 
on  the  part  of  subordinate  officials  toward  the  public ; 
and  that  those  appointed  under  its  rules  frequently  display 
a  lack  of  amenability  to  departmental  discipline.  All  of  these 
objections  are  to  some  slight  degree  justified  by  the  facts, 
but  in  large  part  they  are  without  any  real  foundation  what- 
ever. In  answer  to  them  it  may  reasonably  be  urged  that 


MUNICIPAL  OFFICIALS  AND   EMPLOYEES  285 

civil-service  authorities  are  appointed  to  administer  the  law 
as  they  find  it  and  not  to  exercise  pretorian  powers ;  that 
they  must  be  ever  on  their  guard  against  attempts  to  circum- 
vent the  civil-service  regulations  by  readjustments  within 
departments ;  and  that  such  lack  of  amenability  to  discipline 
as  may  come  from  security  of  tenure  is  not  a  tithe  of  what 
results  from  the  possession  and  use  of  political  influence 
by  public  employees,  where  civil-service  rules  are  not  in 
force. 

The  merit  system  aims  not  only  to  provide  securities  for  The  merit 
the  appointment  of  fit  and  proper  persons  to  municipal  office, 
but  also  to  secure  the  enforcement  of  rational  rules  regarding 
promotions  and  due  safeguards  against  improper  removals. 
Civil-service  control  of  promotions  usually  takes  the  form  of  a 
requirement  that  efficiency  records  shall  be  kept  in  each  city 
department.  These  records  are  intended  to  show  the  degree 
of  competence  or  incompetence  with  which  each  official 
does  his  work,  and  also  to  register  whatever  demerits  may 
stand  against  him.  When  a  promotion  is  to  be  made, 
the  efficiency  records  of  all  the  eligible  candidates  are  ex- 
amined, due  weight  being  given  to  seniority  and  sometimes 
to  the  personal  judgment  of  the  department  head;  and  to 
this  information  is  added  whatever  can  be  obtained  from 
the  holding  of  an  appropriate  competitive  test.  The  candi- 
date who  makes  the  best  average  showing  both  on  the  records 
and  at  the  examination  is  recommended  for  promotion.1 
A  civil-service  commission  usually  finds  difficulty  in  carry- 
ing out  this  system  in  its  entirety;  but  it  is  a  sound  and 
scientific  plan,  supported  both  by  common-sense  and  by 
experience.  Its  steady  extension  seems  inevitable. 

1  One  of  the  very  best  examples  of  the  way  in  which  this  plan  may  be 
applied  with  absolute  fairness  to  all  concerned  was  afforded  in  the  selec- 
tion of  the  present  fire  chief  of  New  York  City.  See  the  issues  of  Good 
Government  for  July- August,  1911. 


286 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


The  require- 
ment of  a 
public 
hearing. 


Civil-service  regulations  that  will  afford  to  competent 
officials  a  real  security  against  wrongful  dismissal,  and  at 
the  same  time  not  preclude  the  removal  of  obvious  misfits, 
are  the  most  perplexing  of  all  to  frame.  Officers  who  prove 
incompetent  in  the  actual  performance  of  their  duties,  or  in- 
capable of  working  in  harmony  with  others,  or  unamenable  to 
reasonable  discipline,  secure  places  in  the  public  employ  by 
way  of  civil-service  competitions  as  by  any  other  scheme 
of  selection,  although  of  course  not  so  frequently ;  and  it  is 
scarcely  arguable  that  such  officials,  whatever  qualifications 
they  may  have  displayed  at  the  time  of  their  appointment, 
have  any  vested  immunity  from  dismissal.  But  all  that  the 
civil-service  authorities  of  most  cities  can  now  require,  and 
all  that  they  do  require,  is  that  reasonable  cause  for  dis- 
charge be  shown.  The  time  may  come  when  public  opinion 
will  everywhere  insist  that  this  reasonable  cause  be  demon- 
strated to  the  satisfaction  of  the  civil-service  commission  (as 
is  now  required  in  Chicago),  or  of  some  other  authority 
qualified  to  judge  impartially  between  an  official  and  his 
superior;  but  that  time  is  not  yet.  At  present  the  civil- 
service  boards  are  usually  constrained  by  the  limitations  of 
law  to  let  the  head  of  the  department  or  the  mayor  decide 
whether  there  is  good  cause  for  the  dismissal  of  a  subordinate 
official  who  has  won  his  place  in  a  fair  and  open  competition. 
Not  infrequently  it  has  been  provided  that  the  removal  of 
such  an  officer  shall  take  place  only  after  the  specific  reasons 
for  his  dismissal  have  been  communicated  to  him  in  writing, 
and  in  some  cases  only  after  he  has  had  a  public  hearing 
before  the  removing  authority. 

These  safeguards  against  unfair  dismissals  are  far  from  be- 
ing iron-clad,  and  they  form  not  a  moiety  of  what  the  logic  of 
a  properly  constituted  merit  system  demands.  Yet  they  are, 
on  the  whole,  somewhat  more  effective  in  actual  operation 
than  they  seem  to  be.  The  requirement,  for  example,  that  an 


MUNICIPAL  OFFICIALS  AND   EMPLOYEES          287 

official  appointed  under  civil-service  rules  shall  have  a  public 
hearing  before  his  removal  goes  into  effect  affords  greater 
security  than  appears  at  first  glance.  Mayors  and  heads 
of  departments  do  not  like  public  hearings  upon  questions 
of  administrative  discipline.  The  official  whose  removal 
is  sought  usually  appears  at  the  hearing  with  an  array  of 
friends,  and  with  the  assistance  of  counsel  who  carry  the  war 
into  the  enemy's  country  by  filing  countercharges  against 
some  one  higher  up.  There  is  likely  to  be  a  general  airing 
of  departmental  grievances,  more  or  less  exaggerated,  which 
the  newspapers  parade  before  the  public  eye.  In  the  end  the 
removal  of  the  recalcitrant  is  almost  certain  to  be  confirmed, 
—  that  is  a  foregone  conclusion  from  the  outset ;  but  the  man 
yields  his  office  only  after  a  contest,  which,  however  unequal, 
at  least  serves  to  bring  his  own  side  of  the  case  to  public 
attention.  Those  who  sit  in  seats  of  judgment  at  the 
city  hall  are  prepared  to  go  through  this  unpleasantness 
when  it  becomes  necessary ;  but  they  do  not  want  it  very 
often.  Removal  hearings,  when  they  come  frequently, 
give  too  much  ammunition  to  the  foes  of  an  administration, 
and  are  liable  to  impair  public  confidence  in  the  mayor's 
ability  to  keep  things  going  without  undue  friction.  They 
do  not,  of  course,  afford  the  degree  of  security  which  compe- 
tent officials  ought  to  have  as  a  matter  of  right ;  but  in  prac- 
tice they  do  furnish  safeguards  of  considerable  value. 

Not  the  least  among  the  virtues  of  the  merit  system  are  Theby 
what  may  be  termed  its  by-products.     The  provision  that 
officials  selected  under  it  shall  serve  probationary  terms  reform- 
before  being  permanently  appointed  is  not  an  invariable 
attribute  of  the  system ;  but  it  fits  in  well  with  the  other 
features,  and  some  cities  have  found  it  useful.     The  practice 
of  announcing  publicly  the  names  of  applicants  for  official 
positions,  and  of  requesting  all  those  who  have  information 
concerning  their  merits  or  faults  to  come  forward  with  it, 


288  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

is  another  appropriate  means  of  insuring  good  results.  In 
Boston,  for  example,  the  names  of  all  those  who,  after  a 
rigid  physical  and  mental  examination,  are  certified  for 
appointment  to  the  police  force  of  the  city  are  posted  in 
every  precinct  station,  with  a  general  request  that  all 
patrolmen  or  officers  who  have  anything  to  say  either  for 
or  against  the  proposed  appointees  will  forward  their  in- 
formation to  the  police  commissioner.  If  there  is  anything 
faulty  in  a  man's  record,  this  procedure  is  very  likely  to  bring 
it  to  the  front.  When  a  patrolman  goes  into  the  ranks  of  the 
Boston  force,  he  does  so  with  what  is  virtually  a  certificate  of 
clean  personal  record  from  every  police  officer  in  the  city ; 
and  that  in  itself  has  contributed  to  the  upbuilding  of  a  whole- 
some professional  spirit  throughout  the  personnel  of  the 
department.  Civil-service  competitions,  moreover,  have 
encouraged  officials  and  employees  to  spend  their  spare  hours 
in  study  rather  than  in  electioneering ;  they  have  helped  to 
dignify  municipal  employment ;  and  they  have  eliminated  a 
great  deal  of  double-dealing  from  the  ranks  of  those  who 
serve  the  city  for  a  livelihood. 
Elimination  Another  incidental  but  much-to-be-praised  achievement 
°f  civil-service  reform  has  been  the  partial,  and  in  some 
instances  the  total,  abolition  of  that  vicious  practice,  so 
common  in  the  heyday  of  the  spoils  system,  of  levying 
political  assessments  upon  municipal  office-holders.  There 
was  a  time  in  New  York  City  when  even  the  scrubwomen 
who  earned  their  dollar  a  day  by  hard  labor  in  the  city  hall 
yielded  their  toll  to  the  party's  war-chest  as  the  price  of 
continued  employment.  That  day  has  gone  by.  Where 
civil-service  regulations  are  rigidly  enforced,  the  municipal 
officials  who  contribute  to  the  campaign  funds  of  either 
party  do  so,  in  most  cases,  of  their  own  accord  and  not  as 
a  matter  of  compulsion.  The  system  likewise  discourages 
the  active  personal  participation  of  city  employees  in  poli- 


MUNICIPAL   OFFICIALS   AND   EMPLOYEES  289 

tics ;  for  when  an  official's  advancement  is  not  secured  by 
party  service  his  interest  in  the  game  of  politics  does  not 
seem  to  carry  him  very  far.  The  civil-service  system  has 
also  put  a  damper  upon  the  activities  of  those  whose  sole 
interest  in  elections  arises  from  a  desire  to  gain  a  place 
among  the  friends  of  an  administration.  In  this  direction 
the  system  has  rendered  very  acceptable  service ;  for  cam- 
paigning done  by  those  whose  only  inspiration  is  the  hope  of 
direct  personal  remuneration  rarely  helps  even  the  party  in 
whose  cause  the  work  is  done. 

The  merit  system  may  also,  through  the  machinery  which  The  stop- 
it  provides,  be  used  to  secure  the  city  treasury  against  vari-  JJ-nop  * 
ous  leakages  that  take  the  guise  of  payments  for  over-  leaks< 
time  work,  or  wages  to  employees  who  are  absent  from  their 
posts,  or  sums  paid  to  men  who  are  alleged  to  have  been 
taken  into  the  city's  service  for  a  few  days  at  a  time  to  meet 
emergencies.  These  are  but  a  very  few  examples  of  the 
many  ways  in  which  municipal  authorities  who  desire 
to  give  employees  more  remuneration  than  the  letter  of 
the  law  allows  frequently  manage  to  gain  their  ends.  To 
require  that  the  weekly  pay-sheets  of  the  municipality  shall 
go  before  the  civil-service  commission  and  be  certified  by  that 
body  before  any  payments  are  made,  is  a  wise  provision, 
as  both  New  York  and  Boston  have  found.  If  generally 
applied  it  would  unquestionably  result  in  the  saving  of  large 
sums  now  squandered  through  the  numerous  channels  in- 
dicated. 

In  the  general  quality  of  the  officials  that  it  manages  The  city's 
to  draw  into  its  regular  service  the  average  American  city  ^p^at 
has  not  set  a  very  high  standard.     This  has  been  due  in  large  employer, 
measure  to  the  use  of  inferior  methods  in  selecting  those  whom 
it  employs,  and  to  the  insecure  tenure  which  it  has  usually 
afforded  them.     In  part,  however,  it  has  resulted  from  the 
city's  failure  to  gain  a  reputation  as  a  fair  employer  of  labor. 


290  GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 

Capable  service  it  has  usually  underpaid  and  too  frequently 
allowed  to  go  otherwise  unrecognized.  The  competent  fore- 
man, draughtsman,  bookkeeper,  or  mechanic  is  not  likely,  if 
he  has  much  ambition,  to  stay  in  the  city's  employ  very  long. 
When  he  gets  an  opportunity  to  better  himself  in  private 
employment,  he  takes  it.  Consequently,  the  municipal  staff 
is  made  up  to  a  large  degree  of  men  who  are  in  point  of  fact 
overpaid,  that  is,  who  get  from  the  city  more  than  their 
abilities  and  industry  would  command  elsewhere.  To 
enter  the  service  of  an  American  city  is  not,  therefore,  as 
it  is  in  Europe,  to  begin  an  administrative  career  which 
leads  to  something  worth  while.  It  is  rather  to  enter  a 
blind  alley  which  leads  nowhere.  The  city  halls  of  the 
country  are  filled  with  men  well  past  middle  age  who  serve 
as  clerks  with  a  weekly  wage  of  twenty  or  thirty  dollars,  and 
are  rarely  worth  it.  For  the  quality  of  the  service  which 
it  procures  for  the  city,  the  municipal  pay-roll  leans  rather 
to  the  side  of  generosity ;  but  the  paradox  remains  that  the 
average  city  pays  too  little  to  secure  the  type  of  service 
that  it  ought  to  have. 

The  care  And  there  is  still  the  problem  of  providing  for  officials 
employees,  and  employees  when  they  have  grown  old  in  the  city's  ser- 
vice. Most  foreign  cities,  and  particularly  the  cities  of  the 
German  Empire,  have  solved  this  problem  by  establishing  a 
municipal  pension  system.  In  America  only  a  very  few  cities 
have  pension  arrangements  of  any  sort;  and  even  these 
systems  apply  to  none  but  such  officials  as  police  officers, 
firemen,  and  schoolteachers.  When,  therefore,  an  official 
or  employee  passes  the  point  of  further  usefulness  to  the 
city,  only  two  courses  are  open.  One  is  to  dismiss  him  from 
the  service  and  let  him  fare  through  old  age  as  best  he  can ; 
the  other  is  to  retain  him  upon  the  municipal  pay-roll  to  the 
exclusion  of  some  younger  and  more  competent  man.  As 
between  these  alternatives  the  city  is  apt  to  choose  the  latter. 


MUNICIPAL  OFFICIALS  AND   EMPLOYEES           291 

Public  opinion  views  with  a  great  deal  of  leniency  the  practice 
of  carrying  on  the  list  of  supernumerary  clerks,  or  on  the 
rolls  of  the  street-cleaning  department,  or  as  janitors  or 
messengers  or  in  some  other  like  capacity,  officials  and  em- 
ployees who  by  reason  of  long  service  have  reached  the  stage 
where  they  no  longer  give  full  return  for  the  wages  paid  to 
them.  Nevertheless,  the  practice  is  both  directly  and 
indirectly  very  expensive.  Not  only  does  it  saddle  the  city 
with  a  heavy  pension-roll  disguised  as  a  salary  and  wage  list, 
but  it  spreads  a  demoralizing  influence  through  the  whole 
municipal  service.  One  need  only  watch  the  operations  of  a 
street  or  a  sewer  gang,  for  example,  to  be  convinced  that  the 
pace  at  which  city  laborers  do  their  work  is  usually  determined 
by  the  oldest  and  least  competent  among  them;  and  the 
same  principle  holds  to  some  extent  throughout  the  city 
departments.  The  practice  of  carrying  superannuated  offi- 
cials and  employees  in  the  active  service  slows  up  the  whole 
labor  machine,  and  thereby  conduces  to  the  costliness  of 
everything  that  the  municipality  undertakes  to  do.  A  pen- 
sion system  applying  to  officials  and  employees  in  every 
branch  of  the  city's  service  would,  therefore,  amply  justify 
itself  on  the  score  of  simple  economy,  provided  it  were  prop- 
erly safeguarded  against  abuse.  To  safeguard  a  pension 
system,  however,  is  not  by  any  means  easy,  unless  the  system 
is  made  to  work  hand  in  hand  with  some  scheme  of  appoint- 
ment that  will  prevent  the  old  and  the  inefficient  from  getting 
on  the  city's  labor  force  at  the  outset.  To  the  average  voter, 
moreover,  the  idea  of  providing  pensions  for  men  who  have 
had  steady  municipal  employment  for  twenty  or  thirty  years 
savors  of  unfairness  to  men  in  private  employments  who 
get  no  such  generosity.  When  pension  schemes  have  been 
submitted  at  the  polls,  they  have  too  often  been  decisively 
rejected.  It  is  a  curious  feature  of  electoral  psychology  that 
the  same  public  opinion  which  allows  the  city's  pay-roll 


292  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

to  be  made  a  medium  of  philanthropy,  and  thereby  tolerates 
a  practice  which  is  unbusinesslike,  expensive,  and  unfair, 
should  balk  so  readily  at  proposals  to  give  civil  pensions 
under  their  proper  name.1 

REFERENCES 

There  is  an  extensive  literature  relating  to  the  problem  of  securing  ca- 
pable administrative  officials  for  American  cities,  most  of  it  listed  under 
the  general  head  of  civil-service  reform.  The  best  general  work  on  the 
genesis  and  rise  of  the  spoils  system,  its  paramountcy,  and  its  steady  dis- 
placement in  favor  of  the  merit  plan  of  appointment  is  C.  R.  Fish's  Civil 
Service  and  the  Patronage  (New  York,  1905).  Besides  covering  the  gen- 
eral field  in  a  comprehensive  way,  this  book  contains  a  well-selected  list 
of  references  to  other  sources  of  information.  The  annual  reports  of  the 
civil-service  commission  of  New  York  and  Massachusetts  regularly  con- 
tain very  informing  discussions  of  the  problems  which  come  to  these 
boards  for  solution  each  year ;  and  the  annual  publications  issued  by  the 
municipal  civil-service  boards  in  Philadelphia,  Chicago,  Kansas  City,  and 
other  important  centres  very  often  deal  with  matters  of  great  interest. 
Special  publications  issued  by  the  civil-service  authorities  from  time  to 
time,  such  as  handbooks  for  the  guidance  of  candidates,  often  throw  light 
on  the  actual  workings  of  the  merit  system.  In  this  connection  special 
mention  should  be  made  of  the  Civil  Service  Text  Book  (1910-1911),  issued 
by  the  civil-service  commission  of  Chicago. 

A  monthly  periodical  known  as  Good  Government,  published  in  New 
York  as  the  official  organ  of  the  National  Civil  Service  Reform  League,  is 
the  best  and  most  inclusive  chronicle  of  what  is  taking  place  day  by  day 
in  the  matter  of  improved  appointing  methods.  The  annual  Proceedings 
of  the  same  organization  also  include  reviews  of  each  year's  progress  made 
by  the  merit  system.  The  charter  provisions  relating  to  civil  service  are 
summarized,  so  far  as  the  larger  cities  are  concerned,  in  A.  R.  Hatton's 
Digest  of  City  Charters  (Chicago,  1906) ;  and  so  far  as  these  provisions 
have  been  inserted  in  charters  of  later  date  they  are  available  in  C.  A. 
Beard's  Digest  of  Short  Ballot  Charters  (New  York,  1911).  A  good  deal 
of  useful  material  relating  to  the  employment  of  labor  by  cities,  partic- 
ularly in  their  water  and  lighting  departments,  is  included  in  the  National 
Civic  Federation's  Report  on  Municipal  and  Private  Ownership  of  Public 

1  In  1910  the  legislature  of  Massachusetts  enacted  a  measure  authoriz- 
ing the  thirty-three  cities  of  the  commonwealth  to  establish  pension  sys- 
tems for  their  employees.  Provision  was  made  that,  to  be  effective  in 
any  city,  the  measure  should  be  first  accepted  by  the  city  council  and  then 
adopted  by  the  people  at  the  polls.  Up  to  the  present  time  sixteen  cities 
have  accepted  the  Act ;  nine  have  rejected  it ;  and  eight  have  taken  no 
action. 


MUNICIPAL  OFFICIALS  AND   EMPLOYEES          293 

Utilities  (3  vols.,  New  York,  1907),  especially  in  the  chapter  entitled 
"Labor  and  Politics"  by  John  R.  Commons.  The  Reports  of  the  Boston 
Finance  Commission  (7  vols.,  Boston,  1908-1912)  also  contain  numerous 
statements  of  fact  and  opinion  bearing  on  the  vice  of  patronage  in  mu- 
nicipal departments  and  on  the  methods  of  eliminating  it.  For  general 
discussions,  see  F.  A.  Cleveland,  Municipal  Administration  and  Account- 
ing (New  York,  1909),  chs.  ii.-iii. ;  Samuel  Whinery,  Municipal  Public 
Works  (New  York,  1903),  chs.  ii.  and  viii. ;  J.  A.  Fairlie,  Essays  in 
Municipal  Administration  (New  York,  1908),  oh.  iii. ;  F.  J.  Goodnow, 
Municipal  Government  (New  York,  1909),  ch.  xi. ;  and  D.  B.  Eaton,  Gov- 
ernment of  Municipalities  (New  York,  1899),  chs.  vii.-viii. 

The  rules  of  law  relating  to  the  rights  and  responsibilities  of  mu- 
nicipal officials  may  be  found  in  J.  F.  Dillon's  Law  of  Municipal  Corpora- 
tions (5  vols.,  Boston,  1911),  I.  §§  392  ff.  Attention  may  also  be  called  to 
article  iv.  of  the  outline  of  suitable  charter  provisions  relating  to  admin- 
istrative officers  that  is  printed  in  the  National  Municipal  League's  Mu- 
nicipal Program  (New  York,  1900),  204-215 ;  and  to  the  "  Draft  of  a  Civil 
Service  Law  for  Cities,"  by  E.  H.  Goodwin,  in  Proceedings  of  the  League 
for  1910,  pp.  577-580. 

On  the  general  question  of  the  proper  internal  organization  of  a  city 
department,  data  can  be  obtained  from  the  publications  of  the  various 
bureaus  of  municipal  research  mentioned  in  the  list  of  references  ap- 
pended to  Chapter  X  above. 


CHAPTER  XII 


CITY  GOVERNMENT  BY  A  COMMISSION 

Theprm-          IN  the  preceding  chapters  an  outline  has  been  given  of 

divided        what  may  be  termed  the  orthodox  type  of  city  government 

powers  in      jn  fae  United  States,  a  system  which  rests  upon  the  principle 

government,  that   legislative   and   administrative   functions   should   be 

vested  in  separate  and  substantially  independent  hands. 

Down  to  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century  no  city 

(with  the  exception  of  the  national  capital)  had  permanently 

departed  from  that  principle.     Powers  were  from  time  to 

time  shifted  about  among  the  several  organs  of  local  govern- 

ment in  the  hope  that   better  results  might   thereby  be 

obtained  ;   but  in  all  cases  the  cities  stood  firmly  upon  the 

doctrine  that  to  concentrate  legislative  and  administrative 

powers  in  the  same  hands  would  be  detrimental  and  dan- 

gerous to  the  best  interests  of  the  citizens. 

The  com-  City  government  by  a  commjsaion_  embodies,  first  of  all,  a 
abaiidona1*11  radical  disregard  of  this  time-honored  theory.  It  starts 
this  prin-  with  the  idea  that  the  principle  of  division  of  powers  has 

•••^•^M  •MB-MMMM&M.  . 

no  place  in  business  administration,  and  hence,  since  the 
work  of  city  authorities  is  business,  not  government,  that 
the  doctrine  should  not  be  recognized  in  the  conduct  of  local 
affairs..  Disregarding  old  notions  concerning  the  usefulness 
of  checks  and  balances  in  governmental  organization,  it 
puts  all  legislative  and  administrative  authority  into  the 
hands  of  the  same  group  of  men.  To  state  it  more  exactly, 
the  commission  plan  abolishes  the  city's  legislative  organs, 
and,  on  the  ground  that  there  is  very  little  legislating  to  be 
done  in  municipalities  anyway,  intrusts  that  little  to  the 

294 


CITY   GOVERNMENT   BY  A   COMMISSION  295 

administrative  commission.  Now,  while  this  general  prin- 
ciple of  governmental  organization  is  out  of  consonance  with 
traditional  theories  of  American  government,  it  is  no  more 
than  an  application  to  cities  of  a  system  which  in  several 
states  of  the  Union  has  long  been  in  operation  as  respects  the 
government  of  counties.  The  county  commission,  exercising 
both  legislative  and  administrative  powers,  long  since 
established  itself  in  various  parts  of  the  country. 

In  its  application  to  city  government  the  commission 
plan,  as  is  well  known,  first  appeared  in  Galveston,  Texas,  a 
little  more  than  a  decade  ago.  Prior  to  1901  Galveston  was 
one  of  the  worst-governed  urban  communities  in  the  whole 
country.  Under  the  old  system  of  jurisdiction  by  a  mayor, 
various  elective  officials,  and  a  board  of  aldermen,  its  munici- 
pal history  managed  to  afford  illustrations  of  almost  every 
vice  in  local  government.  The  city  debt  was  allowed  to 
mount  steadily,  and  borrowing  to  pay  current  expenses  was 
not  uncommon.  City  departments  were  managed  waste- 
fully;  spoilsmen  were  put  into  places  of  honor  and  profit 
in  the  city's  service.  The  accounts  were  kept  in  such  a  way 
that  few  could  understand  what  the  financial  situation  was  at 
any  time.  The  tax-rate  was  high,  and  the  citizens  got  poor 
service  in  return  for  generous  expenditures.  The  outcome 
was  that  a  considerable  element  among  the  voters  had  become 
discouraged  with  the  whole  situation  and  had  ceased  to  mani- 
fest any  interest  in  what  went  on  at  the  city  hall. 

Affairs  were  in  this  condition  when,  in  September,  1900,  a 
tidal  wave  swept  in  from  the  Gulf,  destroyed  about  one-third 
of  the  city,  demoralized  its  economic  organization,  and  put 
the  municipal  authorities  face  to  face  with  the  problem  of  re- 
construction. Before  the  disaster  the  city's  financial  condi- 
tion was  rather  dubious ;  now  its  bonds  dropped  in  value, 
and  it  was  apparent  that  funds  for  the  work  of  putting  the 
city  on  its  feet  could  not  be  borrowed  except  at  exorbitant 


in  Galves- 
ton. 


296  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

rates.1  It  happened  that  much  of  the  real  estate  in  Gal- 
veston  was  held  by  a  comparatively  small  number  of  citizens. 
Some  of  these,  accordingly,  went  to  the  state  legislature 
and  virtually  asked  that  the  city  be  put  into  receivership. 
They  requested  that  the  old  city  government  be  swept  away 
root  and  branch,  and  that  for  some  years,  at  any  rate,  all 
the  powers  formerly  vested  in  the  mayor,  aldermen,  and 
subsidiary  organs  of  city  government  be  given  to  a  commission 
of  five  business  men.  This  drastic  action  they  urged  as  a 
means  of  saving  the  city  from  involvement  in  grave  financial 
difficulties,  if  not  from  actual  bankruptcy.2  Acceding  to 
their  request,  the  legislature  passed  an  act  empowering:  the 
governor  to  appoint  three  of  the  five 


viding_that_the  other  two  be  elected.  A  year  or  two  after 
they  had  taken  office,  however,  a  constitutional  difficulty 
arose.  In  a  matter  which  came  before  the  courts  it  was  held 
that  the  appointment  of  city  officers  by  the  state  authorities 
was  contrary  to  a  provision  in  the  Texan  constitution  ;  8 
whereupon  the  legislature  amended  its  act  by  providing  that 
all  five  members  of  the  Galveston  commission  should  be 
chosen  by  popular  vote.4  The  same  three  commissioners 
who  had  been  holding  office  under  the  governor's  appointment 
were  elected  by  the  voters. 

1  "City  script  sold  at  fifty  cents  on  the  dollar;   and  in  addition  to  a 
floating  debt  of  $200,000,  previously  outstanding,  the  municipality  de- 
faulted in  the  payment  of  the  interest  upon  its  bonds,  which  fell  to 
sixty."  —  E.  S.  BRADFORD,  Commission  Government  in  American  Cities 
(New  York,  1911),  4. 

2  The  Galveston  business  men  who  promoted  the  movement  had  before 
them  the  federal  Act  which  established  the  present  government  of  the 
District  of  Columbia,  also  the  Tennessee  law  which  in  1878  created  the  tax- 
ing district  of  Memphis  and  placed  it  in  charge  of  a  commission  until  the 
city  had  recovered  from  the  yellow  fever  epidemic  of  that  year.    See  the 
article  on  "Commission  Government  in  the  South,"  by  W.  E.  Scroggs,  in 
Annals  of  the  American  Academy  of  Political  and  Social  Science,  November, 
1911. 

1  Ex  parte  Lewis,  45  Texas  Criminal  Reports,  1. 
4  The  change  was  made  on  March  30,  1903. 


CITY   GOVERNMENT  BY  A  COMMISSION  297 

As  thus  amended  in  1903,  the  Galveston  charter  provides  The  Gai- 
for  the  popular  election,  every  two  years,  of  five  commission- 
ers, one  of  them  to  be  entitled  the  mayor-president  and  all 
to  be  chosen  at  large.  The  mayor-president  is  the  presiding 
chairman  at  all  meetings  of  the  commissio^  but  otherwise  he 
has  no  special  powers.  The  commission,  by  majority  vote, 
enacts  all  ordinances  and  passes  all  appropriations,  the  mavor- 
president  having  no  veto  but  voting  like  his  fellow-com- 
missioners. It  further  supervises  the  enforcement  of  its 
own  ordinances  and  regulates  the  expenditure  of  its  own 
appropriations.  Likewise  it  handles  all  questions  relating 
to  franchises  and  locations  in  the  city  streets,  and  all  awards 
of  contracts  for  public  works.  In  a  word,  it  exercises  all 
the  powers  formerly  vested  in  the  mayor,  board  of  aldermen, 
and  other  officials,  acting  either  singly  or  by  concurrence. 
The  commissioners,  by  majority  vote,  apportion  among 
themselves  the  headships  of  the  four  administrative  depart- 
ments into  which  the  business  of  the  city  is  grouped,  — 
namely,  the  departments  of  finance  and  revenue,  water  and 
sewerage,  police  and  fire  protection,  and  streets  and  public 
property.  The  mayor-president  is  not  assigned  to  the  head 
of  any  one  department,  but  is  supposed  to  exercise  a  coordi- 
nating supervision  over  them  all.  Each  of  the  commis- 
sioners is  thus  directly  responsible  for  the  routine  direction  of 
one  important  branch  of  the  city's  business.  Appointments 
to  the  higher  posts  in  each  department  are  not  made  by  the 
commissioner  who  is  in  direct  charge,  but  by  vote  of  the  whole 
commission.  Minor  appointments  are,  however,  left  to  the 
commissioner  in  whose  department  they  may  happen  to  fall.1 

1  Charter  of  the  City  of  Galveston  as  passed  by  the  S8th  Legislature  of  the 
State  of  Texas  and  approved  by  the  Governor,  March  SO,  1903  (Galveston, 
1907) .  A  further  discussion  of  these  charter  provisions  may  be  found  in 
the  author's  paper  on  "The  Galveston  Plan  of  City  Government,"  printed 
in  Proceedings  of  the  National  Municipal  League,  1907,  pp.  142-155,  and 
reprinted  in  C.  R.  Woodruff's  City  Government  by  Commission  (New  York, 
1911),  ch.  iv. 


298 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Extension 
of  the  plan 
to  other 
Texan 

cities. 


Its  spread 
northward. 


It  should  be  remembered  that  the  Galveston  plan  was  not 
at  first  intended  to  be  a  permanent  system  of  government  for 
the  city.  Its  prime  object  was  to  enable  Galveston  to  tide 
over  a  difficult  emergency  just  as  Memphis  had  done  many 
years  before.  Prepared  somewhat  hastily,  with  very  little 
experience  to  serve  as  a  guide,  it  vested  in  the  hands  of  a 
small  body  of  men  more  extensive  final  powers  than  most 
cities  would  care  to  give  away;  but  the  lapse  of  a  few 
years  proved  that  the  new  system  was  a  godsend  to  the 
stricken  community.  The  people's  civic  spirit  was  aroused, 
the  business  of  the  city  recovered  rapidly,  and  in  a  remark- 
ably short  time  the  place  was  again  on  its  feet,  financially 
and  otherwise.  Then  developed  the  conviction  that  com-: 
mission  government  was  a  good  form  to  maintain  perma- 
nently. The  other  cities  of  Texas,  noting  conditions  under 
the  new  regime  in  Galveston,  came  forward  and  asked  the 
legislature  for  similar  charters ;  and  in  the  course  of  a  few 
years  commission  charters  had  been  given  to  all  the  impor- 
tant cities  of  the  state,  including  Houston,  Dallas,  El  Paso, 
Austin,  and  Fort  Worth. 

This  development  naturally  attracted  attention  in  other 
states,  and  the  reform  organizations  of  various  Northern 
cities  began  to  discuss  the  possibility  of  applying  the  scheme 
to  the  solution  of  their  own  municipal  problems.  The  first 
municipality  outside  of  Texas  to  accept  the  plan  w««  T)pa 
Moines.  the  capital  city  of  Iowa.  In  1907  the  Iowa  legisla- 
ture passed  an  act  permitting  any  city  of  the  state  having 
a  population  of  more  than  25,000  to  adopt  a  commission 
type  of  government ;  and  forthwith  the  citizens  of  Des 
Moines,  by  whom  the  act  had  originally  been  brought  for- 
ward and  urged,  took  advantage  of  the  new  provision.1 

1  Laws  of  Iowa,  1907,  p.  48  (approved  March  29,  1907,  and  adopted  at  a 
special  election  in  Des  Moines  on  June  20,  following).  The  Amendments 
to  the  original  Act  may  be  found  in  Laws  of  Iowa,  1909,  pp.  53-63,  and  in 


CITY   GOVERNMENT   BY  A   COMMISSION  299 

The  Des  Moines  plan  of  government  by  commission  is  TheDea 
simply  a  new  edition  of  the  Galveston  plan,  similar  in  out-  pi^ne£ 
line  but  embodying  some  novel  features.  In  brief,  it  provides 
for  a  commission  consisting  of  a  mayor  and  four  councillors, 
all  elected  at  large  for  a  two-year  term  by  the  voters  of  the 
city.  To  this  body  is  intrusted  all  the  powers  hitherto 
vested  in  the  mayor,  city  council,  board  of  public  works, 
park  commissioners,  boards  of  police  and  fire  commissioners, 
board  of  waterworks  trustees,  board  of  library  trustees, 
solicitor,  assessor,  treasurer,  auditor,  city  engineer,  and  all 
other  administrative  boards  or  officers.  Under  the  Des 
Moines  plan  the  business  of  the  city  is  grouped  into  five 
departments,  namely,  public  affairs,  accounts  and  finances, 
public  safety,  streets  and  public  improvements,  and  parks 
and  public  property.  By  the  terms  of  the  charter  the  com- 
missioner who  is  elected  mayor  of  the  city  becomes  head  of 
the  department  of  public  affairs^  each  of  the  other  com- 
missioners  is  put  at  the  head  of  one  of  the  other  depart- 
ments by  majority  vote  of  the  commission,  or  council,  as 
the  body  is  called  in  Iowa.  All  officers  and  employees  of 
the  various  departments  are  appointed  by  the  council,  which 
also  has  authority  to  choose  a  board  of  three  civil-service 
commissioners  to  administer,  under  its  direction,  the  state 
laws  relating  to  civil  service.  Most  of  the  city  officers  come 
within  the  scope  of  these  laws. 

Thus  far  the  system  diverges  but  very  slightly  from  the  Differences 
Galveston  plan.  The  chief  difference  lies  in  the  fact  that  c^veaton*1 
the  Des  Moines  scheme  incorporates  what  are  commonly  »nd.Des 

^-BB-M^BBBBB""""""^^** ••  ••^•••••••^fcB  Moines 

termed  the  newer  agencies  of  democracy  r  namely,  the  initia-  plans, 
tive,  referendum,  protest,  and  recall,  and  makes  provision 


ibid.,  1911,  pp.  37-40.  The  full  text  of  the  law  is  printed  in  E.  S.  Brad- 
ford's Commission  Government  in  American  Cities  (New  York,  1911),  312- 
338 ;  also  in  C.  R.  Woodruff's  City  Government  by  Commission  (New 
York,  1911),  319-354. 


300  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

for  pominations  by^  general  non-partisan  primary.  The 
initiative  is  the  right  of  twenty-five  per  cent  of  the  qualified 
voters  of  the  city  to  present  to  the  council  by  petition  any 
proper  ordinance  or  resolution,  and  to  require,  if  such  ordi- 
nance or  resolution  be  not  passed  by  the  council,  that  it  be 
submitted  without  alteration  to  the  voters  by  referendum. 
If  at  such  referendum  it  receives  a  majority  of  votes,  it  be- 
comes effective.  The  protest  affords  a  means  of  delaying 
the  operation  of  ordinances  enacted  by  the  council  until  the 
voters  can  have  an  opportunity  to  express  themselves.  By 
this  expedient  no  ordinance  passed  by  the  council  (except 
an  emergent  measure)  can  go  into  effect  until  ten  days  after 
its  passage.  Meanwhile,  if  a  petition  protesting  against 
such  ordinance,  signed  by  twenty-five  per  cent  of  the  voters 
of  the  city,  is  presented  to  the  council,  it  is  incumbent  on 
that  body  to  reconsider  the  matter.  If  the  ordinance  is  not 
entirely  repealed,  it  must  then  be  submitted  to  the  voters 
for  their  acceptance  or  rejection.  The  vote  takes  place  at 
a  regular  election,  if  there  is  one  within  six  months ;  other- 
wise at  a  special  election  held  for  the  purpose.  If  indorsed 
at  the  polls,  the  ordinance  becomes  effective  at  once;  if 
rejected  by  the  voters,  it  remains  inoperative.  It  is  further 
provided  in  the  Des  Moines  charter  that,  no  public-utility 
franchise  of  any  sort  shall  he  valid  imt.il  mnfirmpH  fry  thft 
electorate.  The  recall  provision  permits  the  voters  to  remove 
from  office  any  member  of  the  council  at  any  time  after  three 
months'  tenure  in  office.  Petitions  for  recall  or  removal 
must  be  signed  by  at  least  twenty  per  cent  of  the  voters, 
and  the  question  of  recalling  a  councilman  is  put  before 
them  at  a  special  election.  All  nominations  in  Des  Moines 
are  made  at  a  non-partisan  primary,  and  the  ballots  used  at 
the  subsequent  elections  bear  no  party  designations. 
Results  in  The  new  regime  in  Des  Moines  seemed  to  begin  inaus- 
Moinee.  piciously.  Those  citizens  who  had  been  behind  the  new 


CITY   GOVERNMENT  BY  A  COMMISSION  301 

charter  movement  put  forward  their  slate  of  candidates, 
consisting  of  business  and  professional  men  of  standing  who 
had  not  been  prominent  in  the  partisan  politics  of  the  city 
under  the  old  dispensation.  A  vigorous  campaign  for  the 
election  of  this  group  was  undertaken,  but  when  the  ballots 
were  counted  it  was  found  that  the  opponents  had  proved 
stronger  at  the  polls.  The  first  council  under  the  new  char- 
ter was,  accordingly,  made  up  of  men  who  had  been  more  or 
less  closely  affiliated  with  the  old  order  of  things,  and  some 
of  whom  were  thought  to  be  more  proficient  as  politicians 
than  as  administrative  experts.  It  was  therefore  assumed 
in  many  quarters  that  the  new  machine  had  slipped  a  cog, 
with  the  result  that  the  city  was  likely  to  have  an  adminis- 
tration of  the  old  type  under  a  new  name.  But  the  error 
of  this  assumption  soon  became  apparent;  for  the  experi- 
ence of  a  few  years  has  proved  that  the  caliber  and  quali- 
fications of  the  men  in  office  are  not  more  important  than, 
the  system  under  which  they  are  expected  to  carry  on  their 
work.  There  is  little  question  that  the  administration 
of  affairs  in  Des  Moines  has  been  very  much  more  efficient 
since  the  commission  took  charge  in  April,  1908,  than  it  was 
during  the  years  preceding  that  date.1 

Since  its  adoption  in  Des  Moines  the  spread  of  the  re-  Recent 
vised  commission  system  has  been  rapid.  During  the  next 
four  years  a  great  many  cities,  scattered  about  in  more 
than  twenty  different  states,  abolished  the  old  system  and 
established  the  new  one.  Some  of  these  are  cities  with  popu- 
lations exceeding  50,000,  but  in  general  the  commission 

1 A  somewhat  over-enthusiastic  account  of  what  the  system  has 
achieved  in  Des  Moines  is  given  in  J.  J.  Hamilton's  Dethronement  of  the  City 
Boss  (New  York,  1910 ;  later  edition,  under  the  title  of  City  Government 
by  Commission,  1911).  A  more  conservative  summary  of  results  may  be 
found  in  B.  F.  Shambaugh's  Commission  Government  in  Iowa:  the  Deg 
Moines  Plan,  printed  by  the  State  Historical  Society  of  Iowa  (Iowa  City, 
1912). 


302  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

plan  seems  to  appeal  more  strongly  to  the  smaller  urban 
centres.  A  list  of  the  cities  that  have  adopted  the  system, 
or  some  variation  of  it,  would  contain  at  present  the  names 
of  more  than  two  hundred  municipalities.1  Perhaps  half 
as  many  more  have  projects  of  charter  revision  in  hand,  and 
in  all  of  these  the  commission  scheme  of  government  is  re- 
ceiving due  consideration.  It  is  worthy  of  remark,  however, 
that  only  one  city  with  a  population  exceeding  200,000  has  as 
yet  adopted  the  system,  and  that  it  has  been  put  to  trial  in 
only  seven  cities  with  populations  exceeding  100,000.  More 
than  half  the  total  number  of  municipalities  which  have  com- 
mission government  are  places  with  less  than  5000  people. 

Thus  far  it  seems  to  hq,v^  fiprvpH  nhiVflv  n.a  a  sr>hpmP  nf  l^w^ 

government.  But  almost  everywhere  the  voters  have  taken 
kindly  to  it,  and  wherever  the  question  of  adopting  the  system 
has  been  put  before  the  people  at  the  polls  they  have,  with 
very  few  exceptions,  accepted  it.  As  yet  there  have  been 
no  backsliders :  no  city  has  gone  back  to  the  old  plan  after 
trying  the  new. 

Variation  Considerable  variation  in  details  will  be  found  among 
commission  charters,  but  most  of  the  points  of  difference 
are  of  slight  importance.  The  term  for  which  commis- 
sioners are  elected  varies  from  a  single  year  to  six  years,  but 
two-year  and  four-year  terms  are  the  most  common.2  Mem- 
bers of  the  commission  are  usually  paid,  the  annual  stipends 
ranging  from  a  few  hundred  to  several  thousand  dollars  per 
annum.  In  nearly  all  commission  cities  the  distribution 
of  administrative  work  among  the  members  is  made  after 
the  commission  has  met  and  organized  for  business,  but  in 

1  The  list,  as  it  stood  on  January  1,  1912,  may  be  found  in  the  Engineer- 
ing News  for  April  4,  1912,  pp.  638-639.  Many  of  the  more  important 
commission  charters  are  printed  in  C.  A.  Beard's  Digest  of  Short  Ballot 
Charters  (New  York,  1911). 

1  In  Gloucester,  Massachusetts,  the  term  is  one  year ;  in  Guthrie, 
Oklahoma,  it  is  six  years. 


CITY  GOVERNMENT  BY  A  COMMISSION  303 

a  few  cities  the  commissioners  are  elected  directly  to  stated 
departments  ;  that  is  to  say,  one  commissioner  is  elected 
director  of  public  safety,  another  director  of  finance,  and 
so  on.1  Something  may  be  said  in  favor  of  each  method; 
but  on  the  whole  the  plan  of  electing  five  commissioners  with- 
out any  reference  to  the  special  administrative  work  which 
each  will  have  to  do  is  almost  sure  to  be  the  better  one.  This 
is  because  the  commission  is  not  intended  to  be  a  set  of  ad- 
ministrative experts;  no  body  directly  elected  ever  can  be  Itiaa 
such.  The__£Qininission  is  rather  a  small  board  of  amateurs 


who  will  secure  expert  officials  and  take  advice  from  them.  amateur 

~i****~~~~~—-—~~~~*it~~-~*a~-~—*~~—~—~~~**~*mv-~a~~~m~  i       and  expert 

If  this  fundamental  principle  be  disregarded,  if  elective  service. 
commissioners  attempt  to  conduct  their  departments  either 
without  expert  advice  or  in  disregard  of  it,  the  new  plan  of 
municipal  government  will  hardly  take  us  very  far  in  the 
direction  of  more  efficient  or  more  economical  administra- 
tion. When  the  voters  are  asked  to  elect  men  directly  to 
the  headships  of  designated  departments,  they  are  almost 
sure  to  look  more  or  less  for  special  qualifications  on  the 
part  of  candidates  who  come  forward.  It  is  taken  for 
granted  that  the  director  or  supervisor  of  finance,  for  ex- 
ample, ought  to  be  some  one  who  before  his  election  has 
had  a  connection  with  financial  affairs.  Hence  it  is  that, 
under  this  system  of  choosing  department  heads,  the  candi- 
date with  special  qualifications  of  an  inferior  sort  is  likely 
to  be  preferred  to  the  broad-gauge  candidate  whose  claims 
are  of  a  more  general  nature  but  vastly  better  in  quality. 
It  is  -difficult  to  resist  the  impression,  therefore,  that  com- 
missioners elected  to  designated  duties  will  usually  be  men 
of  rather  mediocre  capacity  who  happen  to  possess  some- 
thing that  looks  to  the  voters  like  peculiar  fitness,  but 
is  not  so  in  reality.  Under  no  plan  of  local  government 

1  This  is  the  practice  in  Lynn,  Massachusetts,  and  in  Grand  Junction, 
Colorado. 


304 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


Merits  of 
mission* 


ment. 


i.  Concen- 


ought  a  second-rate  engineer  to  be  preferred  to  a  first-rate 
lawyer  or  physician  or  banker  or  mechanic  as  supervisor 
of  streets  ;  yet  he  undoubtedly  would  have  some  advantage 
over  the  latter  in  any  electoral  contest  where  special  quali- 
fications happen  to  be  thrust  into  the  foreground.  To 
look  for  specialized  skill  in  the  individual  commissioners 
is  to  impair  one  of  the  strong  features  of  the  whole 
commission  plan,  which  is  the  combination  of  strictly  ama- 
teur with  strictly  expert  administration,  each  operating  in 
its  proper  sphere. 

In  its  actual  working  the  new  system  has  shown  itself 
possessed  of  many  advantages.  Of  these  the  most  strik- 
mS  one>  °f  course,  arises  from  the  fact  that  the  plan  puts 
an  en(j  to  that  intolerable  scattering  of  powers,  duties,  and 
responsibilities  which  the  old  type  of  city  government  pro- 
moted to  the  point  of  absurdity.  By  enabling  public  attention 
to  focus  itself  upon  a  narrow  and  well-defined  area,  it  al- 
lows the  scrutiny  which  voters  apply  to  the  conduct  of  their 
representatives  to  be  real,  and  not,  as  heretofore,  merely 
perfunctory.  The  system  does  not  guarantee  that  a  city's 
administration  shall  be  always  free  from  good  ground  for_ 
criticism,  —  no  system  can  do  that  ;  but  it  does  guarantee 
that,  when  the  administration  is  faulty,  there  shall  be  definite 
shoulders  upon  which  to  lay  the  blame.  Under  the  com- 
mission plan  the  responsibility  cannot  be  bandied  back  and 
forth  in  shuttlecock  fashion  from  mayor  to  council  and  from 
the  council  to  some  administrative  board  or  officer.  Issues 
cannot  be  clouded  by  shifty  deals  among  several  authorities. 
In  thus  eliminating  a  chaos  of  checks  and  balances,  another 
name  for  which  is  friction,  confusion,  and  irresponsibility, 
the  new  framework  removes  from  the  government  of 
American  cities  a  feature  which,  to  say  the  least,  has  in 
practice  been  unprofitable  from  first  to  last. 

Sponsors  of  commission  government  assured  us,  even  be- 


CITY   GOVERNMENT  BY  A  COMMISSION  305 

fore  the  plan  had  had  a  fair  trial,  that  they  proposed  a  scheme  2.  Makes 
of  organization  which  would  give  cities  a  business  adminis-  ^thoS 
tration.     They  pointed  out  that  the  management  of  a  city's  pp88^6  "» 

J        city  admin- 
affairs   is   not   government,   but   business.     The   so-termed  istration. 

city  government,  they  urged,  is  not  primarily  a  maker  of 
laws  and  ordinances.  It  is  a  body  which  combines  in  one 
the  work  of  a  construction  company,  of  a  purveyor  of  water, 
sewerage  facilities,  and  fire  protection,  of  an  accounting  and 
auditing  corporation,  of  the  people's  agent  in  dealings  with 
public  corporations,  and  so  forth.  Its  day-by-day  functions 
can  scarcely,  by  any  stretch  of  the  imagination,  be  termed 
political  or  governmental.  Go  through  the  records  of  a 
city-council  meeting  and  catalogue  the  items  that  can  be 
classed  as  legislation,  or  that  can  in  any  way  be  said  to  de- 
termine broad  questions  of  administrative  policy.  The  list 
will  be  very  short  indeed.  By  far  the  greater  part  of  a 
council's  proceedings  have  to  do  with  matters  of  routine 
administration  which  differ  slightly,  if  at  all,  from  the  ordi- 
nary operations  of  any  large  business  concern.  Now,  no. 
business  organization  could  reasonably  hope  to  keep  itself 
out  of  the  hands  of  a  receiver  if  it  had  to  do  its  work 
with  any  sucn  clumsy  and  complicated  machinery  as 
that  which  most  American  cities  have  had  imposed  upon 
them.  What  would  be  thought  of  a  business  corporation 
that  intrusted  the  conduct  of  its  affairs  to  a  twin  board  of 
directors  (one  board  representing  the  stockholders  at  large 
and  the  other  representing  them  by  districts),  and  gave  to 
an  independently  chosen  general  manager  some  sort  of  veto 
power  over  them,  besides  subjecting  his  appointments  to 
their  concurrence?  How  long,  for  example,  would  a  rail- 
road endure  this  sort  of  management  without  a  cut  in  its 
dividend  rate  and  a  demoralization  of  its  service  ?  It  is, 
of  course,  quite  true  that  a  city  is  something  more  than  a 
profit-seeking  business  enterprise.  The  affairs  of  the  mu- 


306 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


3.  Reduces 
adminis- 
trative 
friction  and 
delay. 


nicipality  cannot  be  conducted  in  defiance  of  public  opinion, 
or  even  in  disregard  of  it ;  whereas  business  management  may 
or  may  not  bend  to  popular  pressure,  as  it  may  deem  expedi- 
ent, —  and  expediency  is  here  another  word  for  profitable- 
ness. We  have  the  testimony  of  Bismarck  that  public 
opinion  is  the  worst  foe  to  expertness  in  diplomacy;  and 
in  the  same  sense  it  may  be  termed  the  chief  obstacle  against 
which  expertness  in  any  branch  of  public  administration  has 
to  contend.  Any  system  of  government  that  from  its  very 
nature  must  yield  to  every  passing  gust  of  popular  senti- 
ment carries  a  serious  handicap.  To  measure  it  in  terms  of 
economy  or  efficiency  with  private  business  management  is 
therefore  unfair,  unless  large  allowances  be  made.  It  should 
nover  be-^rgottenthat  a  city  must  ^ive  its  people  the  sort 
of  administration  they  want,  and  that  tips  ia  not  always 
synonymous  with  what  is  best  or  cheapest.  All  this  is  not 
to  deny,  however,  that  there  is  much  room  for  the  appli- 
cation of  so-called  business  principles  in  city  administration, 
or  that  measures  which  simplify  administrative  machinery 
always  promote  greater  efficiency.1 

The  system  of  city  government  bv  commission,  it  is  con- 
tended, enables  a  city  to  conduct  its  business  promptly  and_ 
without  undue  friction.     There  may  be  wisdom  in  a  multi- 
tude of  counsellors,  but  the  history  of  those  municipalities 
which  maintain  large  deliberative  bodies  seems  to  warrant 

1  It  is  to  be  feared  that  many  commission-governed  cities  have  allowed 
themselves  to  be  deluded  into  the  idea  that  the  mere  establishment  of  the 
new  system  is  a  guarantee  of  thorough  improvement  in  the  methods  of 
conducting  public  business.  Many  commission  charters  seem  to  take  it  for 
granted  that  any  able-bodied  citizen  can  be  transformed  into  a  municipal 
expert  by  popular  vote,  and  that  the  mere  act  of  putting  the  whole  con- 
duct of  the  city's  business  into  the  hands  of  five  men  who  bear  appropriate 
titles  will  secure  a  complete  change  from  slovenly  to  efficient  methods. 
At  any  rate,  commission  charters  are  too  commonly  deficient  in  the  matter 
of  making  definite  provisions  for  the  employment  of  genuine  skill  in  the 
various  departments  under  the  supervision  of  the  elective  commissioners. 


CITY   GOVERNMENT  BY  A  COMMISSION  307 

the  impression  that  this  collective  wisdom  is  not  of  very 
high  grade.  Unwieldy  councils  have  been  put  upon 
American  cities  under  the  delusion  that  democracy  some- 
how associates  itself  with  unwieldiness.  There  is  a  no- 
tion in  the  public  mind,  and  it  is  as  deep-seated  as  it  is 
illusive,  that  a  body  cannot  be  representative  unless 
it  is  large  to  the  pitch  of  uselessness  for  any  effective 
action.  Even  deliberative  bodies,  however,  reach  a  point 
of  diminishing  returns,  and  American  municipal  experience 
seems  to  show  that  this  point  is  not  fixed  very  high. 
Prior  to  the  adoption  of  the  charter  amendments  of  1909 
the  city  council  of  Boston  contained  eighty-eight  members ; 
the  board  of  aldermen  had  thirteen  members  elected  at 
large,  and  the  common  council  seventy-five,  elected  three 
from  each  of  the  twenty-five  wards  of  the  city.  If  mere 
numbers  give  any  assurance  of  sagacity  or  care  for  the  public 
well-being,  this  body  should  have  afforded  that  doctrine  some 
exemplification.  But  in  point  of  fact  the  council  gave  "no 
serious  consideration  to  its  duties";  it  was  "dominated  by 
spoilsmen";  its  efforts  were  "often  directed  to  the  pecuni- 
ary benefit  of  its  members"  ;  and  the  councillors  were,  for  the 
most  part,  men  who  were  "not  truly  representative  citizens 
and  would  not  be  elected  if  their  constituents  knew  the  facts 
and  could  vote  for  any  one  else."  From  the  viewpoint  of 
facility  in  expediting  business,  an  interesting  commentary 
upon  the  way  in  which  the  city  council  was  organized 
is  afforded  by  the  fact  that  it  maintained  forty-two 
standing  committees,  not  half  of  which  met  even  once  a 
year.  Its  work  on  the  annual  appropriations  consisted 
of  little  more  than  a  series  of  studied  attempts  to  raise 
the  estimates  to  the  maximum  figures  permitted  by  law, 
especially  in  those  departments  which  had  the  largest 
patronage.  Its  alleged  "deliberations"  were  mainly  des- 
ultory talk  upon  matters  that  did  not  come  within  its 


308 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


The  short- 
comings 
of  large 
councils. 


4.  Improves 
the  quality 
of  municipal 
officers. 


Jurisdiction,  such  as  the  conduct  of  departmental  heads, 
the  letting  of  contracts,  and  the  hiring  of  city  laborers. 
For  the  salaries  of  aldermen  and  councillors,  office  ex- 
penses, wages  of  clerks,  stenographers,  and  messengers, 
and  for  other  charges,  the  city  of  Boston  paid  out  nearly 
$100,000  per  annum,  a  large  part  of  which  was  sheer  waste.1 

What  has  been  said  of  the  old  council  in  Boston  may 
be  said  without  much  reservation  of  all  large  bicameral  city 
councils.  They  are  ill  adapted  to  the  work  which  tdlfiY  arft 
expected  to  do.  To  say  that  they  display  greater  regard  for 
the  interests  of  the  people,  or  more  conservative  judgment 
in  the  handling  of  questions  of  policy,  than  do  small  councils 
of  five,  seven,  or  nine  men  is  to  talk  arrant  nonsense.  The 
history  of  large  councils  is  in  general  little  more  than  a  rec- 
ord of  political  manoeuvring  and  factional  intriguery,  with 
a  mastery  of  nothing  but  the  art  of  wasting  time  and  money. 
A  council  of  some  half-dozen  men  offers  at  least  the  possibility 
of  despatch  in  the  handling  of  city  affairs ;  for  its  small  size 
removes  an  incentive  to  fruitless  debate,  and  affords  little 
opportunity  for  resort  to  those  subterfuges  in  procedure 
which  serve  mainly  to  create  needless  friction  and  delay. 

But  the  chief  merit  urged  in  behalf  of  the  commission  plan 
is  not  that  it  concentrates  responsibility  and  permits  the 
application  of  business  methods  to  the  conduct  of  a  city's 
affairs,  important  as  these  things  are.  In  the  last  analysis, 
municipal  administration  is  as  much  a  question  of  men  as 
of  measures.  Tocqueville  once  said  that  in  his  time  the 
men  of  Massachusetts  could  prosper  under  any  sort  of  con- 
stitution ;  and  even  to-day  the  cities  of  England  manage  to 
secure  efficient  and  economical  administration  under  a 
system  that  seems  on  its  face  excellently  adapted  to  promote 
inharmony  and  extravagance.  Efficiency  in  city  adminis- 
tration may  be  assisted  by  one  form  of  local  government 
1  Boston  Finance  Commission,  Reports,  II.  196  ff.  (1909). 


CITY   GOVERNMENT   BY  A  COMMISSION  309 

or  retarded  by  another,  but  in  the  long  run  it  is  not  less  a 
question  of  personnel  than  of  political  framework.  Much 
depends,  accordingly,  upon  the  answer  to  the  query  whether 
the  commission  form  of  government  does  or  does  not  offer  any 
assurance,  or  even  a  reasonable  prospect,  that  it  will  tend  to 
install  better  men  in  the  city's  posts  of  power  and  responsibil- 
ity. This  is,  after  all,  the  crucial  question ;  and  the  advocates 
of  the  system  answer  it  unequivocally.  The  plan  will,  they 
feel  certain,  serve  to  secure  better  men.  Indeed,  it  can 
hardly  help  doing  so,  they  assure  us ;  for  it  is  almost  a  com- 
monplace of  political  experience  that  the  caliber  of  men  in 
public  office  is  closely  related  to  the  amount  of  power  and 
authority  which  they  exercise.  When  power  is  scattered 
among  many  officers  of  government,  no  more  of  it  is  likely 
to  fall  to  the  share  of  each  one  than  might  quite  safely  be 
intrusted  to  a  man  of  mediocre  ability ;  and  when  authority 
can  safely  be  given  over  to  men  of  this  type  it  almost  cer- 
tainly will  be.  Men  of  little  experience  and  less  capacity 
have  found  it  easy  to  get  themselves  elected  to  membership 
in  large  city  councils,  for  the  reason  that  their  presence 
there  could,  even  at  the  worst,  do  little  harm,  owing  to  the 
numerous  statutory  checks  put  upon  the  council's  power. 
When  membership  in  a  city  council  means  the  exercise  of 
no  more  than  one  seventy-fifth  part  of  less  than  one-third  of 
a  city  government's  jurisdiction,  it  is  not  surprising  that  the 
post  of  councillor  appeals  only  to  men  whose  standing  in 
the  community  is  negligible.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  all 
municipal  authority  can  be  massed  in  the  hands  of  five 
men,  each  of  these  individuals  has  an  opportunity  to 
become  a  real  power  in  the  community,  which  is  the  only 
motive  that  will  draw  capable  men  to  the  council-board. 
Finally,  as  the  sponsors  of  the  commission  plan  remind  us, 
large  councils  mean,  as  a  rule,  the  election  of  councillors  by 
wards  or  by  petty  districts,  a  method  that  has  proved  itself 


310  GOVERNMENT   OP  AMERICAN   CITIES 

a  tolerably  certain  way  of  securing  inferior  men ;  whereas  a 
small  council  can  be  chosen  at  large,  on  ballots  that  have  no 
partisan  designations,  and,  if  so  desired,  by  some  system  of 
preferential  voting. 

Has  im-  Now,  the  line  of  argument  outlined  in  the  preceding  para- 

irTtheme  graph  sounds  reasonable,  and  it  may  be  that  in  the  two 
citybofficl™  ^undred  or  more  cities  which  have  adopted  commission 
been  se-  government  a  marked  improvement  in  the  quality  of  elective 
office-holders  has  on  the  whole  been  secured.  Either  to  prove 
or  to  disprove  this  proposition  by  trying  to  find  out  what 
changes  have  taken  place  in  all  these  cities  would  be  a 
difficult  undertaking;  but  an  examination  of  ten  impor- 
tant municipalities  now  governed  under  the  new  plan 
discloses  the  fact  that,  out  of  the  fifty  commissioners  at 
present  in  office,  no  fewer  than  thirty-five  were  public  offi- 
cials in  these  places  before  the  commission  system  was  in- 
troduced. This  showing  seems  to  carry  the  implication 
that  the  plan  is  not  revolutionary  in  regard  to  the  type 
of  official  brought  into  service.  It  would,  perhaps,  be 
more  in  accord  with  the  actual  facts  to  say  that  the  intro- 
duction of  the  simplified  form  of  municipal  organization 
proves  its  usefulness  not  so  much  in  drafting  a  better  class 
of  men  into  public  office  as  in  permitting  the  same  men  to^ 
achieve  better  results.  It  is,  at  any  rate,  the  testimony  of 
those  who  have  served  under  both  the  old  plan  and  the  new 
that  the  latter  gives  greater  opportunity  and  greater  in- 
centive ;  and  it  is  the  experience  of  those  cities  which  have 
been  under  commission  arrangements  for  several  years  that, 
whatever  may  have  been  the  effect  upon  the  personnel  of 
the  administration,  the  change  has  had  a  salutary  influence 
upon  the  whole  tone  of  municipal  affairs.  The  evidence 
on  this  point  is  too  extensive,  and  comes  from  too  many 
authoritative.sources,  to  be  questioned.1 

1  See  references  at  the  end  of  this  chapter. 


CITY   GOVERNMENT   BY  A  COMMISSION  311 

On  the  other  hand,  the  commission  type  of  city  govern-  objections 
ment  meets  with  some  objections  in  all  parts  of  the  country,  mission °n 
According  to  its  opponents,  it  is  based  upon  a  wrong  prin-  plan> 
ciple  and  proposes  a  dangerous  policy ;  and  it  is  accordingly 
branded  as  oligarchical,  undemocratic,  and  un-American, 
Under  such  designations,  however,  it  merely  shares  company  i.  General 
with  almost  every  other  practical  scheme  for  the  improve-  obiectlons- 
ment  of  municipal  administration  that  has  come  before  the 
public  during  the  last  quarter-century.  To  urge  that  be- 
cause a  governing  body  is  small  it  must  inevitably  prove  to 
be  bureaucratic  in  its  methods  and  unresponsive  in  its  at- 
titude, is  merely  to  afford  a  typical  illustration  of  politicians' 
logic.  Whether  a  public  official  or  a  body  of  officials  will 
become  oligarchical  in  temper  depends  not  upon  mere 
numbers,  but  upon  the  directness  of  the  control  which  the 
voters  are  able  to  exercise  over  those  whom  they  put  into 
office.  And  effectiveness  of  control  hinges  largely  upon 
such  matters  as  the  concentration  of  responsibility  for  offi- 
cial acts,  an  adequate  degree  of  publicity,  and  the  elimina- 
tion of  such  features  as  party  designations,  which  serve  to 
confuse  the  issues  presented  to  the  voters  at  the  polls.  In 
fact,  it  might  almost  be  laid  down  as  an  axiom  deducible 
from  American  municipal  experience  that  the  smaller  an 
elective  body  the  more  tnorough  its  accountability  to  the 
electorate.  If  one  brushes  away  the  shallow  sophistry  of 
those  who  urge  the  retention  of  a  large  city  council  as  a  means 
of  insuring  responsibility  to  popular  sentiment,  and  regards 
only  the  outstanding  facts  in  a  half-century  of  American 
municipal  history,  one  sees  pretty  readily  that  the  supporters 
of  the  old  order  are  urging  a  high  premium  on  mediocrity 
in  public  office,  a  continuance  of  the  vice  of  sectionalism  in 
city  administration,  and  an  arrangement  under  which  re- 
sponsibility directs  itself  to  a  few  political  bosses  rather  than 
to  the  whole  municipal  electorate. 


312  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

2.  it  offers        Commission  government,  we  are  often  told,  is  inadequately 
no.secun  y     representative  :    five^jn£n^_cliQseji_at  -Jfflge^—  .cannot  repre- 


sentative       sent  the  varied  interests,  nnlitical.  p-pnfrra.rthina.1.  raniftl.  n.nrl 
city  govern-   •^•••^••••••••••••••••^•••'^•••••'^•••^••^••'^••••^•'^ 

ment.  economic,  in  any  ^arg£_niunLcipalitv.     If  it  l^o  true  tfrat  in 

the  conduct  of  his  local  affairs  a  vjat^r-fi^uajiQlJ^^pqimtply 
represented  except  by  one  of  his  own  neighborhood,  race, 
religion,  politics,  and  business  interests,  then  this  criti-_ 
cism  is  entirely  reasonable.  But  1,8  this  not  the  reductio 
ad  absurdum  of__tli£—  representative  principle  ?  Would  not 
a  recognition  of  this  doctrine  absolutely  preclude  all  chance 
of  securing  a  municipal  administration  loyal  to  the  best 
interests  of  the  city  as  a  whole,  and  reduce  every  issue  to  a 
m$lee  of  sectional  and  personal  prejudices?  It  has  been 
frequently  proved  that  a  single  official,  like  the  president  of 
the  nation  or  the  governor  of  a  state  or  the  mayor  of  a  city, 
may  more  truly  represent  popular  opinion  than  does  a  whole 
congress  or  state  legislature  or  municipal  council.  Popular 
sentiment  is  not  difficul^  to  ascertain  when  a  public  officer 
takes  the  trouble  to  ascertain  itr  Five  men  can  do  it  quite 
as  well  as  fifty,  and  they  are  much  more  likely  to  try.  A 
large  council  means  ward  representation,  and  ward  repre- 
sentation means  that  councilmen  with  narrowed  horizons 
must  determine  large  questions  of  municipal  policy.  It  does 
not  mean,  in  practice,  that  all  the  interests  of  the  elector- 
ate will  be  represented;  on  the  contrary,  it  more  often 
means  that  some  of  the  most  important  interests  will  have 
little  or  no  chance  of  representation  at  all.  As  a  matter  of 
plain  fact,  a  large  council,  with  members  chosen  from  wards, 
means  that  the  citizens  who  are  not  personally  interested 
in  ward  politics  are  quite  likely  to  be  represented  in  slim 
fashion,  if  at  all,  whereas  alert  politicians  with  selfish  in- 
terests to  serve  are  sure  to  be  grossly  over-represented. 
Large  councils  can  with  reasonable  certainty  be  depended 
upon  to  give  adequate  representation  to  one  interest  and  to 


CITY    GOVERNMENT   BY   A   COMMISSION  313 

that  only,  —  the  machine  of  the  dominant  political  party. 
That  they  secure  fair  representation  for  a  variety  of  non- 
political  interests  is  a  fiction  that  has  no  existence  outside 
of  the  wardroom. 

"  It  is  almost  a  maxim  that  the  smaller  the  body  the  easier  3.  it  pro- 
can  it  be  reached  and  influenced."  Thus  runs  the  gist  of  an  actainStra- 
argument  commonly  advanced  by  the  opponents  of  the  com-  tio°  dan«er- 
mission  plan.  In  other  words,  it  is  easier  for  large  public-ser-  ceptibie  to 
vice  corporations,  or  for  the  liquor  interests,  or  for  the  mere  control, 
seekers  after  loaves  and  fishes  in  city  administ ration  T  to  cor± 
rupt  or  coerce  five  councillors  than  fifty ;  hence,  there  is  safety 
in  numbers^  The  trouble  with  this  argument  is,  however, 
that  it  rests  upon  a  false  presumption.  It  assumes  that  sin- 
ister influences  exert  themselves  directly  upon  the  councilmen 
one  by  one,  and  hence  that,  where  a  large  council  exists, 
the  forces  of  corruption  or  coercion  must  deal  with  a  large 
body  of  men.  That  this  is  not  the  case,  however,  every  one 
who  has  had  anything  to  do  with  municipal  politics  knows 
very  well.  Large  councils  are,  for  the  most  part,  made  up 
of  men  who  owe  their  nomination  and  election  to  political 
leaders  to  whom  they  are  under  permanent  obligations  and 
from  whom  they  take  their  orders.  A  few  bosses,  sometimes 
a  single  boss,  can  control  a  majority  of  the  council  and  can 
deliver  the  necessary  votes  to  any  proposition  when  the 
proper  incentive  appears.  Corporations  or  contractors  who 
wish  to  get  what  they  are  not  entitled  to  have  do  not  ap- 
proach the  council  through  its  members  one  by  one;  they 
know  the  ways  of  the  machine  too  well  for  that.  They 
deal  with  the  middleman,  —  that  is  to  say,  with  the  political 
leader  who  controls  the  votes  of  councilmen.  Accordingly, 
they  have  to  do  with  perhaps  five  men,  not  with  fifty,  and, 
what  is  more,  with  five  men  who  have  power  without  re- 
sponsibility, who  were  not  invested  with  authority  by  the 
voters  and  are  consequently  not  accountable  to  them  for 


314 


Merits  of 
this  objec- 
tion. 


the  abuse  of  it.  Under  commission  government,  on  the 
contrary,  a  favor-seeking  private  interest  has  to  deal  not 
with  a  few  middlemen  wno  have  thevotes  of  others  to  deliver, 
but  with  five  men  who  are  free  to  act  as  they  think  best  and 
who  act  with  the  eves  of  the  voters  upon  them.  A  small 
council  or  commission  means  concentration  of  power,  but 
it  also  means  centralization  of  responsibility.  A  large  council 
means  an  equal  concentration  of  power,  but  of  power  that 
too  often  is  not  so  much  in  the  hands  of  the  councilmen  as 
in  those  of  a  few  outside  political  bosses  who  are  in  a  posi- 
tion to  dictate  what  the  council  shall  or  shall  not  do,  —  men 
who  have  the  power  without  the  responsibility.  Centraliza- 
tion of  power  there  will  be  in  any  case,  and  must  be  if  busi- 
ness is  to  be  conducted  with  promptness  and  efficiency.  No 
matter  what  the  frame  of  city  government  may  be,  the  domi- 
nating influences  are  pretty  sure  to  gravitate  into  the  hands 
of  a  few  men. 

The  issue  as  between  a  large  and  a  small  council  hangs, 
in  the  main,  on  the  simple  question  whether  these  few  men 
shall  be  chosen  directly  by  the  voters  at  large  and  be  di- 
rectly responsible  to  them,  or  whether  they  shall  be  political 
manipulators  without  any  direct  responsibility.  Phila- 
delphia has  a  municipal  legislature  which  comprises,  in  both 
its  branches,  190  members ;  yet  there  is  no  city  in  the  United 
States  in  which  corporate  interests,  working  through  a  small 
group  of  political  henchmen,  have  so  completely  and  so 
consistently  dominated  the  city  council's  attitude  upon 
questions  of  municipal  policy.  It  is  not  in  the  size  of  its 
municipal  council  that  a  city  may  reasonably  hope  to  find 
assurance  against  malfeasance  in  the  management  of  its 
affairs,  against  the  bartering  away  of  valuable  privileges 
for  inadequate  returns,  against  the  subordination  of  the 
public  welfare  to  private  avarice.  Its  safety  lies  rather  in 
the  size  of  the  men  who  compose  the  council.  There  is  more 


CITY   GOVERNMENT  BY  A  COMMISSION  315 

security  in  five  men  of  adequate  caliber,  working  in  the  full 
glare  of  publicity  and  directly  accountable  to  the  people  of 
the  whole  city,  than  in  ten  times  as  many  men  of  the  type 
usually  found  in  the  ranks  of  large  municipal  councils. 

Objections  have  been  urged  against  commission  govern-  4.  it  violates 
ment  on  the  ground  that  it  puts  into  the  hands  of  a  single  J^JjpL  of 

small  body  of  men  the  power  both  to  appropriate  and  to  spend  government 
..."      *  a  '  i   *""          '  .     .        . .         i       .T  by  conceQ- 

pubiic  money,     ouch  an  arrangement,  it  is  said,  and  said  tratingthe 

truly,  violates  an  established  principle  of  American  govern- 
ment  which  demands  that  in  the  interest  of  economy  and 

•*  powers  in 

honesty  these  two  powers  should  be  lodged  in  separate  hands.  the  Bame> 

bands. 

In  keeping  with  this  dogma,  Congress  appropriates  money 
for  the  general  expenses  of  national  government,  but  the 
executive  disburses  the  funds  so  appropriated.  The  state 
legislatures  make  appropriations,  but  the  state  executives 
apply  the  funds  as  directed.  Even  in  the  government  of  the 
New  England  town  it  is  the  local  legislature  or  town-meeting, 
and  not  the  board  of  selectmen,  which  makes  the  annual 
appropriations ;  and  in  the  usual  type  of  city  administration 
the  council  grants  the  funds  and  the  executive  officials  make 
the  actual  outlay. 

From  this  traditional  division  of  powers  the  commission  is  this  a 
system  proposes  a  radical  departure.  It  commits  to  a  sin-  tlon?  J< 
gle  small  board  the  power  of  fixing  the  annual  tax-rate,  of 
appropriating  the  revenues  to  the  different  departments, 
and  of  supervising  the  detailed  expenditure  of  the  funds  so 
apportioned.  Novel  as  this  plan  is,  it  is  not  necessarily 
either  dangerous  or  objectionable  on  that  account.  Many 
novel  features  have  come  into  American  governmental  methods 
within  comparatively  recent  years,  —  the  Australian  ballot, 
for  example,  civil-service  regulations,  direct  primaries,  the 
initiative,  referendum,  and  recall,  public-utilities  commissions, 
etc. ;  and  all  have  had  to  meet  the  cry  that  they  involved 
departure  from  the  time-honored  way  of  doing  things  in  this 


316  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

country.  Moreover,  the  fusion  of  appropriating  and  spend- 
ing powers  in  the  organization  of  city  government  is  not 
unprecedented.  This  very  principle  is  at  the  foundation  of 
the  English  municipal  system ;  and,  as  the  world  knows,  it 
has  proved  in  operation  neither  a  source  of  corruption  nor 
an  incentive  to  extravagance.  Furthermore,  those  Ameri- 
can cities  which  have  had  the  commission  form  of  govern- 
ment for  several  years  find  nothing  objectionable  in  this 
blending  of  the  two  powers ;  on  the  contrary,  their  ex- 
perience with  it  seems  to  indicate  that  it  possesses  some 
important  advantages  over  the  old  plan  of  separation,  jt 
appears  toinsp|re  greater  care  in  making  the  appropriations, 
and  to  promote  greater  success  in  keeping  within  them  when 
made^  Under  its  influence  commission  budgets  are,  so  far 
as  recent  experience  goes,  framed  with  a  fairer  regard  for  the 
interests  of  the  whole  city  than  council  budgets  have  usually 
been,  and  commissions  have  unquestionably  not  proved  to  be 
less  capable  in  handling  expenditures  than  were  the  uncoor- 
dinated executive  boards  and  officials  that  formerly  had  charge 
of  such  work.  The  indictment  of  commission  government 
on  this  score  is  not  supported  by  experience.  It  is  a 
sentimental  objection,  worth  no  more  than  such  objections 
usually  are.  Ward  politicians  can,  of  course,  always  be 
counted  upon  to  sob  over  this  "departure  from  time- 
honored  American  traditions"  and  "disregard  of  the  wis- 
dom of  the  Fathers,"  till  one  unacquainted  with  their 
ways  might  almost  be  moved  to  regard  the  Declaration 
of  Independence  as  a  document  framed  for  the  self-evi- 
dent purpose  of  assuring  to  professional  politicians,  mainly 
of  alien  extraction,  an  inalienable  right  to  inflict  a  long 
train  of  abuses  upon  the  taxpayers  of  American  cities. 
One  may  add,  finally,  that  even  if  danger  should  arise 
from  this  feature  of  the  commission  form  of  government, 
yet  the  cities  which  adopt  the  sysiem  usually  provide  a_ 


CITY   GOVERNMENT   BY   A  COMMISSION  317 

means  of  recalling  commissioners,  if  need  bef  as  an  additional 
safeguard  against  the  abuse  of  power.  In  this  way,  as 
Montesquieu  suggested,  power  is  made  a  check  to  power. 

A  much  more  substantial  objection  to  the  commission  5.  it  does 
plan  arises  from  the  fact  that  it  practically  abolishes  the  JJJfoS  con-* 
office  of  mayor,  that  it  does  not  provide  an  apex  for  the  clusionin 

«•——«•—«—--——  -JiMM^>—^_-^--—  •«—-—••——  -«LM—  ——-•----—  «—-—Ji—«»i  "•     concentrat- 

pyramid  of  local  administration.     Now,  the  mayoralty  is  a 


post  that  has  established  a  fair  tradition  in  America,  and 
there  is  a  rational  function  for  it  to  perform.  It  stands  in 
the  public  imagination  as  the  one  municipal  office  in 
which  all  administrative  responsibility  can  be  centralized. 
To  lodge  all  such  power  and  responsibility  in  the  hands  of  five 
men  is  better  than  to  put  it  in  the  hands  of  fifty  ;  but  to  place 
most  of  it  in  the  hands  of  one  man,  duly  surrounded  by  the 
necessary  safeguards,  is  better  still.  Nearly  all  the  argu- 
ments that  can  be  advanced  in  favor  of  the  five-headed  exec- 
utive can  be  urged  with  greater  cogency  for  the  policy  of 
concentrating  all  final  powers  of  an  administrative  character 
in  the  mayor  alone.  The  small  council  or  commission  with- 
out a  mayor  is  apt  to  act  like  a  machine  without  a  balance- 
wheel.  If  it  is  desirable  to  follow  the  oft-quoted  example  of 
private  business  organizations,  let  it  be  borne  in  mind  that, 
although  all  large  and  successful  business  corporations 
are  in  theory  managed  by  boards  of  directors,  the  actual 
power  and  responsibility  rest  almost  invariably  in  the  hands 
of  their  chief.1 
As  is  too  frequently  the  practice  of  whose  who  stand  General 

,  -  .  f  .      .  conclusions. 

sponsors  for  reform,  the  advocates  of  commission  govern- 
ment have  in  all  probability  promised  more  than  their  plan 
can  permanently  achieve.  It  is  true  that  the  new  adminis- 

1  An  interesting  experiment  somewhat  along  this  line,  in  the  way  of 
intrusting  full  charge  of  the  city's  administration  to  a  general  manager, 
has  been  undertaken  during  the  last  two  years  by  Staunton,  Virginia. 
This  experiment  is  described  in  E.  S.  Bradford's  Commission  Government 
in  American  Cities  (New  York,  1911),  oh.  xii. 


318  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

trations  have  set  about  redeeming  their  promises  in  encourag- 
ing fashion ;  but  a  new  broom  sweeps  clean,  and  in  most  of  the 
cities  which  have  adopted  the  commission  arrangements  the 
need  of  general  municipal  housecleaning  was  such  as  to  show 
at  once  the  effect  of  even  a  slight  use  of  the  cleansing  appa- 
ratus. To  hope  that  this  or  any  other  system  will  prove  a 
self-executing  instrument  of  civic  righteousness  is,  however, 
to  avow  an  optimism  which  betokens  little  knowledge  of  man 
as  a  political  animal.  On  the  other  hand,  even  though  the 
great  simplification  of  municipal  machinery  which  the 
commission  system  of  city  government  carries  with  it  may 
not  quite  eliminate  inefficiency,  it  will  at  least  disclose  the 
shoulders  upon  which  the  onus  of  incompetence  should  lie. 
It  will  not  extirpate  the  vice  of  partisanship  from  municipal 
elections,  or  put  the  independent  candidate  for  public 
office  upon  an  equal  footing  with  the  man  who  has  an  or- 
ganized interest  behind  him.  Under  this  system,  as  under 
any  other  plan  of  democratic  government,  the  advantage 
will  rest  with  the  candidate  who  brings  to  bear  upon  the  issue 
at  the  polls  an  aggressive  organization  and  a  fatted  wallet. 
But  it  will  at  least  afford  independence  and  purely  personal 
qualifications  a  fighting  chancer  which  is  more  than  they  have 
had  under  the  old  municipal  system.  The  commission 
plan,  moreover,  links  itself  easily  with  a  dozen  features  that 
promise  improvement  in  various  branches  of  municipal 
administration,  such  as  nomination  by  non-partisan  prima- 
ries or  by  petition,  the  short  ballot  without  party  designa- 
tions, the  abolition  of  ward  representation,  preferential 
voting,  the  merit  system  of  appointment  and  promotion, 
the  extirpation  of  patronage,  publicity  in  all  official  business, 
uniform  city  accounting,  and  the  concentration  of  responsi- 
bility for  injudicious  expenditures  of  public  money.  It  at 
least  promises  a  frame  of  city  government  which  the  average 
voter  can  understand ;  and  a  government  that  is  to  be  re- 


CITY   GOVERNMENT  BY  A  COMMISSION  319 

sponsible  to  the  people  must  first  of  all  be  intelligible  to 
them.  However  the  commission  propaganda  may  develop 
in  future  years,  it  has  at  least  rendered  a  real  service  in 
directing  public  attention  to  the  most  urgent  need  of  the 
American  municipal  system,  —  the  simplification  of  a  ma- 
chine which  is  far  too  complex  for  the  work  that  it  has  to 
do.  As  a  protest  against  the  old  municipal  regime  it  has 
been  effective;  as  a  policy  it  has,  despite  incidental  short- 
comings, fulfilled  much  of  what  its  sponsors 


REFERENCES 

The  output  of  pamphlet  and  periodical  literature  relating  to  the  govern- 
ment of  cities  by  elective  commissions  has  been  very  large  during  the 
last  five  or  six  years.  By  far  the  greater  part  of  it,  however,  is  of  little  or 
no  service  to  serious  students  of  municipal  problems  ;  for  it  represents  no 
more  than  the  expressions  of  partisan  opinion,  based  in  the  main  either  on 
inadequate  data  or  on  no  data  at  all.  For  what  it  is  worth,  this  material 
may  be  found  listed  in  the  bibliographies  appended  to  the  books  mentioned 
in  the  next  paragraph. 

Three  useful  monographs  on  the  general  subject  of  commission  govern- 
ment, two  volumes  of  selected  readings  bearing  on  the  history  and  workings 
of  the  system,  and  one  collection  of  commission  charters  have,  however, 
appeared  from  the  press  within  the  last  two  years.  E.  S.  Bradford's 
Commission  Government  in  American  Cities  (New  York,  1911)  is  a  careful 
analysisof  theplanandof  what  it  has  accomplished.  Dr.F.  H.MacGregor's 
City  Government  by  Commission  (Madison,  1911)  is  a  less  elaborate,  but  a 
well-executed,  study  ;  and  J.  J.  Hamilton's  Dethronement  of  the  City  Boss 
(New  York,  1910,  and  issued  in  1911  under  the  title  of  Government  by 
Commission)  contains  a  statement  of  what  the  author  believes  to  be  the 
administrative  miracles  wrought  by  the  commission  system  in  Des  Moines. 
A  volume  of  Selected  Articles  on  the  Commission  Plan  of  Municipal  Govern- 
ment (ed.  E.  C.  Robbins,  Minneapolis,  1909),  and  another  entitled  City 
Government  by  Commission  (ed.  C.  R.  Woodruff,  New  York,  1911),  contain 
discussions  on  several  phases  of  the  subject  reprinted  from  the  proceed- 
ings of  various  civic  societies,  from  magazines,  and  from  the  columns  of 
newspapers.  In  the  Annals  of  the  American  Academy  of  Political  and 
Social  Science  for  November,  1911,  there  are  several  excellent  papers 
on  the  workings  of  commission  government  in  different  parts  of  the 
Union.  Professor  C.  A.  Beard's  Digest  of  Short  Ballot  Charters  (New 
York,  1911)  includes  all  the  more  important  commission  charters  thus 
far  adopted. 


320  GOVERNMENT   OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 

Official  figures  in  regard  to  what  the  commission  form  of  government 
has  actually  accomplished  are  both  scanty  and  of  little  service.  The 
regular  reports  issued  by  cities  since  the  installation  of  the  new  adminis- 
trative machinery  are  on  the  whole  excellent,  and  some  of  them  are 
models  of  their  kind ;  but  the  reorganization  of  departments,  and  the 
greatly  altered  methods  of  municipal  bookkeeping  which  have  come  into 
being  with  the  new  framework  of  government,  make  it  very  difficult  to 
determine  just  what  any  city  has  gained  in  its  passage  from  the  old  regime 
to  the  new.  There  are  some  interesting  discussions  of  this  matter,  how- 
ever, in  Henry  BruSre's  New  City  Government  (New  York,  1912). 


CHAPTER  XIII 

DIRECT  LEGISLATION  AND  THE  RECALL 

A  RADICAL  departure  from  the  principle  of  separation  of  Direct 
powers  in  local  government,  as  outlined  in  the   preceding  fa^fa™* 
chapter,  is  not  the  only  noteworthy  feature  of  political 
development  in  American  cities   during  the   last  decade. 
Closely  connected  with  it  has  been  a  movement  which  aims  to 
provide  the  cities  with  machinery  whereby  local  legislation 
can  be  carried  to  enactment  directly  by  the  voters,  without 
the  interposition  of  any  representative  body .    This  machinery 
of  direct  legislation  consists  of  the  initiative  and  the  manda- 
tory referendum. 

By  the  initiative  is  meant  the  right  of  a  definite  percentage  Definitions, 
of  the  voters  in  any  municipality  to  propose  charter  amend- 
ments or  ordinances,  and  to  require  that  these  shall  be  sub- 
mitted to  the  people  at  either  a  regular  or  a  special  election. 
If  such  a  proposal  obtains  at  the  polling  a  majority  of  the 
votes  actually  recorded  upon  it,  it  becomes  effective.  By  the 
mandatory  referendum  (or  the  protest,  as  it  is  sometimes 
called)  is  meant  the  right  of  a  stated  proportion  of  the 
voters  to  demand  that  any  ordinance  passed  by  the  city 
council  shall  be  withheld  from  going  into  force  until  the 
opinion  of  the  voters  can  be  expressed  upon  it  at  a  regular  or 
a  special  election.1  It  is,  accordingly,  a  species  of  popular 

1  The  referendum  sometimes  takes  a  more  stringent  form,  i.e.  one  under 
which  measures  (chiefly  charter  amendments)  must  in  all  oases  be  sub- 
mitted to  the  voters,  whether  petitioned  for  or  not.  For  a  full  discussion  of 
definitions  and  of  variations  in  the  use  of  these  terms,  see  B.  P.  Oberholtzer's 
Referendum,  Initiative,  and  Recall  in  America  (new  ed.,  New  York,  1911), 
especially  chs.  ix.,  xiv.-xv. 

T  321 


322  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

veto.    If  a  majority  of  the  vote  polled  upon  such  an  ordinance 
is  in  the  negative,  the  ordinance  does  not  go  into  effect. 
Reasons  for       The  rapidity  with  which  these  so-termed  newer  agencies 
democracy  have  been  taken  into  use  by  cities  throughout 
United  States  is  one  of  the  most  significant  political 

lation  _     (  r 

methods.  phenomena  of  this  generation;  for,  however  opinions  may 
differ  as  to  the  merits  and  defects  of  direct  legislation  or  as 
to  its  compatibility  with  representative  government,  it  is 
at  all  events  not  to  be  denied  that  the  initiative  and  referen- 
dum have  already  gained  a  remarkable  grip  upon  the  public 
confidence  throughout  large  sections  of  the  country.  For 
this  growth  in  popular  favor  a  twofold  reason  may  be 
assigned.  In  the  first  placer  it  is  an  omen  of  a  declining 
.faith  in  the  integrity  and  good  judgment  of  ele^ive  law- 
makers.1 The  quality  of  the  men  who  make  the  ordinances 
in  American  cities,  including  ordinances  which  carry  appro- 
priations and  grant  public  privileges,  has  steadily  declined 
Decline  in  during  the  last  half-century.  Some  of  the  reasons  for  this 
^represent-  deterioration  have  already  been  discussed  in  a  general 
way,  but  the  fundamental  causes  are  too  complex  to  per- 
mit any  statement  of  them  in  concise  form.  At  any  rate, 
the  symptoms  of  decline  are  too  obvious  to  require  any 
testimony  in  regard  to  their  existence ;  the  public  has  be- 
come only  too  well  aware  of  the  fact  that  the  men  who  secure 
election  to  the  councils  of  American  cities  cannot  nowadays  be 
trusted  to  exercise  final  authority  in  matters  of  local  legis- 
lation. Instead,  however,  of  adopting  measures  calculated 
to  remedy  this  trouble  at  its  exact  location  by  improving  the 
caliber  of  councilmen,  a  hundred  or  more  cities  have  had  re- 
sort to  the  more  drastic  step  of  taking  away  from  these 
officials  their  final  ordinance  powers.  In  other  words,  they 

1  For  a  discussion  of  this  feature,  see  the  instructive  chapter  on  "The 
Decline  of  Legislatures"  in  E.  L.  Godkin's  Unforeseen  Tendencies  oj 
Democracy  (Boston,  1898). 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION  AND   THE   RECALL          323 

are  trying  to  secure  proper  administration  of  a  trust,  not  by 
changing  the  trustees,  but  by  reducing  the  powers  which  the 
trustees  may  exercise. 

In  the  second  place,  the  representatives  of  the  people  have  The  use  of 
themselves  fostered  the  popularity  of  the  referendum  by_  dum^iau^ 
training  the  voters  in  its  use.  Both  the  state  legislature  and  ln  °r(|inary 

•  !•          &••••••  statutes. 

the  city  council  have  had  to  do  their  work  of  legislation 
under  serious  handicaps.  Apart  from  their  deficient  per- 
sonnel, they  have  had  to  contend  with  a  system  of  organiza- 
tion and  procedure  which  almost  absolutely  precludes  satis- 
factory results  in  the  enactment  of  laws  and  ordinances.  To 
be  a  smooth-working  and  effective  ordinance-making  body, 
a  city  council  must  have  both  leadership  and  clearly  defined 
powers ;  but  in  most  cases  it  has  neither.  Consequently, 
there  is  opportunity  for  obstruction,  intriguery,  and  all 
manner  of  log-rolling  tactics ;  irrelevant  issues  are  liable  to 
be  dragged  into  matters  under  consideration;  and  council- 
men  often  find  that  the  only  way  to  avoid  antagonizing  some 
important  section  of  the  electorate  is  to  turn  the  whole  matter 
over  to  the  voters  for  their  decision.  In  both  state  and 
city  the  referendum  has  thus  become  an  expedient  for  the 
evasion  of  responsibility  by  those  legislators  whose  first  care 
is  for  their  own  political  futures.  At  first  a  very  exceptional 
procedure,  the  practice  of  passing  bills  and  ordinances  with 
a  referendum  clause  attached  has  become  a  sort  of  line  of  least 
resistance  in  the  solution  of  difficult  legislative  problems.1 
The  voters  have  been  taught  to  believe  that  they  alone  can 
settle  such  matters  satisfactorily;  and,  having  had  this 
function  intrusted  to  them  as  a  matter  of  policy,  they  have 
come  to  demand  it  as  a  right. 

Despite  a  prevalent  impression  to  the  contrary,  direct  origin  of 

the  initia- 
tive and 
1 A  good  survey  of  the  optional  referendum  may  be  found  in  E.  P.  Ober-  referendum. 

holtzer's  Referendum,  Initiative,  and  Recall  in  America  (New  York,  1911), 
eh.  viii. 


324 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Their  early 
use  in  the 
adoption  of 
American 
state  con- 
stitutions. 


Extension 
to  ordinary 
legislation. 


legislation  is  not  new  either  in  principle  or  in  practice. 
The  initiative  and  referendum  are  new  names  for  very  old 
institutions ;  for,  so  far  as  there  was  legislation  at  all  in  early 
democracies,  it  was  direct  legislation.  As  agencies  of  law- 
making,  both  features  have  existed  in  Switzerland  for  a 
long  time;  and  even  in  America  they  are,  as  applied  to 
constitutional  matters,  among  the  oldest  of  indigenous  in- 
stitutions. As  early  as  1777  the  first  constitution  of  the  state 
of  Georgia  gave  the  people  the  exclusive  right  to  propose 
constitutional  amendments;  and  other  eighteenth-century 
frames  of  government,  including  those  of  Massachusetts, 
Pennsylvania,  and  New  Hampshire,  established  a  sort  of  po- 
tential initiative  by  reserving  to  the  people  the  right  to  give 
instructions  to  their  representatives.  Massachusetts  used 
the  referendum  in  the  adoption  of  her  first  constitution  in 
1779,  and  before  long  the  practice  of  ratifying  constitutions 
and  constitutional  amendments  in  this  way  became  almost 
universal  throughout  the  country.  But  even  yet  its  use 
is  not  everywhere  mandatory  as  regards  constitutional 
changes,  for  three  states  of  the  Union  have  altered  their 
constitutions  without  popular  approval  within  the  last  two 
decades.1 

The  use  of  the  referendum  as  part  of  the  machinery  of 
ordinary,  as  distinguished  from  organic,  law-making  also, 
began  at  a  comparatively  early  date  in  American  history.  In 
1825  the  legislature  of  Maryland  submitted  to  the  voters  of 
that  state  a  law  providing  for  the  establishment  of  free 
primary  schools,  and  made  the  measure  operative  as  soon 
as  the  electors  should  have  pronounced  their  approval  of 
it.  Other  states  followed  the  example,  till  in  the  course  of 


1  South  Carolina  in  1895,  Delaware  in  1897,  and  Virginia  in  1902. 
The  best  account  of  the  development  of  the  constitutional  referendum 
Is  that  given  in  W.  F.  Dodd's  Revision  and  Amendment  of  State 
tions  (Baltimore,  1910). 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION   AND   THE   RECALL          325 

time  it  became  the  practice  to  insert  in  state  constitutions  a 
provision  requiring  legislatures  to  submit  to  the  people  all 
matters  that  came  within  certain  categories,  as,  for  instance, 
changes  in  the  location  of  the  state  capital,  alterations 
in  the  suffrage  requirements,  measures  pledging  the  credit 
of  the  state,  and  modifications  in  the  system  of  taxation. 
Such  classes  of  matters  upon  which  the  will  of  the  electorate 
must  be  ascertained  before  new  laws  affecting  them  can  go 
into  force  have  steadily  increased,  until  in  some  states  they 
embrace  a  wide  range  of  important  subjects.1 

From  the  states  the  referendum  passed  to  use  in  the  cities.  Applies  to 
Local  antagonism  to  the  practice  of  legislative  interference^  c 
with  city  affairs  led  to  the  insertion  in  state  constitutions  of, 
various  provisions  forbidding  changes  in  city  charters  with- 
out the  approval  of  the  voters  in  the  municipalities  concerned  ; 
and  even  when  such  provisions  were  not  put  into  the  con- 
stitutions,  it  nevertheless  became  customary  for  legislatures 
to  submit  city  charters  to  popular  vote  before  enacting 
them  into  law.  In  due  course  the  list  of  matters  to  which 
this  policy  applied  was  extended  to  include  not  only  charters, 
but  also  many  other  matters  of  general  municipal  policy. 
When  state  laws  provided  changes  in  municipal  boundaries, 
or  changed  the  legal  status  of  a  municipality,  or  authorized 
the  issue  of  bonds  on  the  credit  of  the  city,  or  gave  some 
public-service  corporation  a  franchise,  it  came  to  be  the 
practice  of  the  legislature  to  attach  to  such  measure  a  clause 
providing  for  its  reference  to  the  municipal  voters  before 
it  should  become  operative.  The  adoption  of  the  local- 
option  policy  in  regard  to  the  sale  of  intoxicants  also  carried 
with  it  a  large  extension  of  the  custom  of  submitting  ques- 
tions of  local  importance  to  the  voters  of  the  municipalities 

1  The  entire  list  may  be  found  in  F.  J.  Stimson's  Federal  and  State 
Constitutions  of  the  United  States  (Boston,  1908),  especially  pp.  279-283, 
341-359. 


326  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

for  their  decision.1    It  has  come  to  pass,  accordingly,  that  in 
many  states  the  municipal  voters  look  upon  their  privilege. 
of  deciding  such  matters  as  a  sort  of  inalienable  right ;   and 
in  some  jurisdictions  it  is  actually  a  right,  guaranteed  to, 
them  by  provisions  in  the  state  constitution. 

Early  uses  The  use  of  foe  initiative  in  the  process  of  ordinary  legisla- 
hutia^ve.  ti°n  did  no*  come  until  the  referendum  had  gained  a  firm 
footing.  Although  r^nprnispH  «.«  a.  mpf.hod  of  changing  con- 
stitutions, it  was  rarely  used  in  this  domain.  In  the  making 
of  ordinary  laws,  however,  a  field  in  which  it  never  had  overt 
recognition  until  recent  years,  it  was  employed  somewhat 
more  commonly;  for  the  initiative  sometimes  afforded  the 
only  agency  through  which  a  certain  type  of  laws  could  be 
secured.  When,  for  example,  a  state  constitution  prohibited 
the  legislature  from  enacting  special  laws  for  individual 
cities,  there  seemed  to  be  only  two  ways  of  providing  munici- 
palities with  charters.  One  was  to  enact  a  general  law 
applying  to  all  cities  of  whatever  size,  a  system  open  to 
grave  practical  objections.  The  other  was  to  provide  by 
general  statute  that  each  city  might,  under  proper  safeguards, 
propose  and  adopt  its  own  charter.  This  plan,  commonly 
known  as  the  home-rule  charter  system,  brought  the  initiative 
into  real  activity;  for  it  proceeded  on  the  principle  that 
a  certain  number  of  registered  voters  should  by  means  of  a 
petition  take  the  first  official  step  toward  the  enactment  of 
a  city's  organic  law.2  The  adoption  of  the  home-rule  charter 
system  by  Missouri  in  1875  may,  therefore,  be  said  to  have 
brought  the  initiative  directly  to  the  front  as  an  agency  of 
ordinary  local  legislation.  The  first  establishment  of  the 
institution  on  a  state-wide  basis,  however,  came  in  South 

1  See  the  chapter  on  "The  Referendum  on  Local  Option  Liquor  Laws" 
in  E.  P.  Oberholtzer's  Referendum,  Initiative,  and  Recall  in  America  (New 
York,  1911). 

1  See  above,  pp.  61-72. 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION  AND  THE   RECALL          327 

Dakota  during  1898 ;    and  since  that  time  it  has  gained 
recognition  in  ten  other  states  of  the  Union.1 

Hand  in  hand  with  the  spread  of  direct-legislation  Relation 
provisions  in  these  various  states  has  gone  the  acceptance  municipal 
of  similar  arrangements  in  a  large  number  of  American  reforms- 
cities,  where  the  movement  has  gained  impetus  from  the 
propaganda  for  the  simplification  of  municipal  machinery. 
The  spread  of  commission  government,  for  example,  has 
given  the  initiative  and  referendum  much  of  their  vogue  so 
far  as  the  field  of  local  administration  is  concerned^  To 
be  more  exact,  one  should  perhaps  say  that  each  movement 
has  helped  the  other.  A  system  of  city  government  by  a 
small  commission  appeared,  when  it  was  first  proposed, 
to  possess  large  possibilities  of  danger  through  concentration 
of  final  powers  in  a  very  few  hands ;  and  it  probably  would 
not  have  secured  approval  in  so  many  cities  if  no  departure 
had  been  made  from  the  original  Galveston  type.  But  the 
sponsors  of  the  commission  plan  put  forward  the  initiative, 
referendum,  and  recall  as  instruments  whereby  the  policy  of 
lodging  great  powers  in  a  small  board  could  be  safeguarded 
against  possibility  of  abuse.  The  Des  Moines  scheme  of 
commission  government,  which  has  been  followed  by  most 
of  the  cities,  is  simply  the  Galveston  plan  plus  the  initia- 
tive, referendum,  and  recall,  together  with  provision  for 
non-partisan  methods  of  nomination.  The  commission 
plan  thus  gave  direct  legislation  a  good  deal  of  momentum 
in  the  realm  of  city  government ;  for  of  the  two  hundred 
or  more  cities  which  have  adopted  it  the  majority  have 
accepted  direct-legislation  provisions  as  well. 

Charter  provisions  concerning  the  initiative  and  referen- 

iUtah,  1900;  Oregon,  1902;  Montana,  1906;  Oklahoma,  1907; 
Maine,  1908 ;  Missouri,  1909 ;  Arkansas  and  Colorado,  1910 ;  Arizona 
and  California,  1911.  The  exact  provisions  may  be  found  in  C.  A.  Beard 
and  B.  E.  Shultz's  Documents  on  the  State-wide  Initiative,  Referendum,  and 
Recall  (New  York,  1912).  *  See  above,  ch.  xii. 


328 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


The  ma- 
chinery of 
direct 
legislation 
in  cities. 


dum  differ  from  city  to  city  as  to  details,  but  their  general 
purport  is  everywhere  much  the  same.  They  give  the  voters 
of  a  city  the  right,  by  means  of  a  petition  bearing  a  stated 
quota  of  signatures,  to  propose  any  ordinance  or  other  local 
measure  which  comes  within  the  charter  jurisdiction  of  the 
municipality.  The  number  of  signatures  varies  from  ten  to 
twenty-five  per  cent  of  the  total  electorate,  but  in  some  cities 
the  requirement  is  expressed  in  fixed  terms  and  not  as  a 
percentage.1  These  petitions  are  filed  with  some  designated 
municipal  officer,  usually  the  city  clerk,  who  examines  the 
signatures  and  certifies  that  the  number  is  or  is  not  adequate. 
Thereupon  the  proposal  set  forth  in  the  petition  is  submitted 
to  the  voters  of  the  city  either  at  the  next  regular  election 
or  at  a  special  one  called  for  the  purpose.  The  general 
practice  is  to  submit  such  measures  at  the  regular  election, 
if  there  is  to  be  one  before  long ;  but  if  no  regular  polling  is 
scheduled  for  several  months  from  the  date  at  which  a  peti- 
tion is  presented,  a  special  election  is  usually  provided  for. 
To  become  operativeT  the  measure  must  usually  receive  a. 
majority  of  the  votes  polled  upon  the  question,  not  a  majority 
of  the  votes  cast  in  general.  This  is  because,  at  regular 
elections,  the  number  of  votes  cast  for  candidates  is  usually 
much  larger  than  the  number  recorded  upon  any  question 
submitted  to  the  electorate ;  hence,  to  require  a  majority  of 
the  general  polled  vote  would  be  to  put  the  affirmative  of 
any  specific  proposal  at  a  serious  disadvantage. 

So,  too,  with  provisions  in  city  charters  relative  to  the 
protest,  or  referendum.2  It  is  usually  arranged  that  no 

1  In  Memphis,  Tennessee,  the  petition  must  be  signed  by  500  voters.  A 
table  showing  the  percentage  requirements  in  fifty  cities  is  printed  in 
E.  S.  Bradford's  Commission  Government  in  American  Cities  (New  York, 
1911),  223-233. 

1  The  exact  provisions,  as  they  appear  in  the  charters  of  a  large  number 
of  cities,  are  given  in  C.  A.  Beard's  Digest  of  Short  Ballot  Charters  (New 
York,  1911). 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION   AND   THE   RECALL  329 

ordinance  or  resolution  of  the  city  council  (or  commission)  o> 
shall  go  into  effect  for  a  certain  period  after  its  enactment.  ^?__ 
Meanwhile  a  designated  percentage  of  the  voters  may  peti- 
tion to  have  the  measure  submitted  at  the  polls ;  and,  if  the 
petition  is  found  to  comply  with  the  requirements,  it  is 
brought  forward  at  either  a  regular  or  a  special  election. 
The  number  of  petitioners  necessary  in  the  case  of  routine 
ordinances  ranges  from  ten  to  twenty-five  per  cent  of  the 
whole  electorate;  but  for  ordinances  that  grant  franchise 
privileges  or  authorize  the  issue  of  bonds  a  different  require- 
ment is  frequently  provided.  Sometimes  a  smaller  percentage 
of  signatures  is  stipulated ;  or  a  charter  may  even  require 
that  such  ordinances  shall  go  before  the  voters  without  the 
filing  of  any  petition,  —  in  other  words,  that  a  referendum  on 
such  matters  shall  be  compulsory.  In  any  case,  if  the 
voters  pronounce  by  a  majority  against  an  ordinance,  it 
does  not  go  into  effect. 

Both  the  initiative  and  the  referendum  have  been  freely  Actual  use 
employed  during  the  last  half-dozen  years  by  several  of  those  tive  and'*13 
cities   in  which   charter  provisions   have   made   their   use  referendum- 
possible.     Portland,  Oregon,  began   in   1909   by   referring 
thirty-five    questions    to    its    voters;     Denver,    Colorado, 
followed  in  1910  with  twenty-one;   and  during  the  last  two 
years  a  dozen  other  cities  have  joined  the  list,  each  submitting 
from  two  to  twenty  projects  at  the  annual  election.     Subjects 
of  every  sort  are  brought  forward,  from  important  charter 
amendments  to  matters  so  trivial  that  they  seem  hardly 
worthy  of  regulation  by  special  ordinance.1     Sometimes  the 
question  is  so  simple  and  so  plainly  worded  that  it  calls  for  no 
special  knowledge  on  the  part  of  the  voters.     In  other  cases 
it  deals  with  so  complicated  a  problem  and  is  worded  so 

1  In  Pontiac,  Michigan,  for  example,  the  voters  were  last  year  asked 
to  decide  whether  bicycle  riding  should  be  permitted  upon  the  city's 
sidewalks. 


330  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

trickily  that  it  presents  a  very  difficult  task  to  the  voter 
who  has  not  an  intimate  acquaintance  with  the  exact  facts 
of  the  situation.  It  is  extremely  hard  to  judge  from  a  mere 
reading  of  such  ballots  just  how  important  are  the  matters 
printed  upon  them.  Many  of  the  questions  certainly  do 
not  appear  on  their  face  to  deal  with  any  broad  questions  of 
municipal  policy ;  but  interpreted  in  the  light  of  local  condi- 
tions they  may  be  of  much  greater  account  than  they  seem 
to  be.1 

Data  still  Notwithstanding  the  freedom  with  which  the  initiative 
for  general!-  &nd  referendum  have  been  called  into  action  by  many  cities 
during  the  last  few  years,  it  is  not  yet  safe  to  make  very 
broad  predictions  from  the  data  at  hand.2  The  tendencies 
shown  by  voters  at  a  time  when  a  system  is  new  to  them  are 
not  always  the  ones  which  become  permanently  established. 
Discussions  concerning  the  merits  and  defects  of  direct 
legislation  are  still  largely  empirical,  and  must  continue  to  be 
so  for  some  time  to  come,  at  least  until  the  system  has  been 
in  operation  long  enough  to  create  some  definite  traditions. 
With  an  insufficient  body  of  data  to  work  upon,  it  is 
only  natural  that  current  ideas  as  to  the  future  of  direct 
legislation  and  its  reaction  upon  the  representative  system 
should  differ  widely;  in  fact,  there  is  probably  no  topic 

1  A  careful  study  of  the  questions  submitted  at  the  Portland  election 
of  June,  1911,  is  embodied  in  Professor  G.  H.  Haynes's  article  on  "People's 
Ruie  in  Municipal  Affairs  "  in  Political  Science  Quarterly,  XXVI.  432-442 
(September,  1911). 

1  A  list  of  over  100  questions  submitted  to  the  voters  of  twenty  Ameri- 
can cities  during  the  last  three  years  shows  that  a  large  proportion  of  the 
measures  proposed  by  the  initiative  deal  with  changes  in  the  general 
structure  of  municipal  government  or  with  franchises.  Other  questions 
in  the  list  concern  such  matters  as  the  widening  of  a  street,  the  rebuilding 
of  a  bridge,  the  use  of  direct  primaries,  the  adoption  of  a  new  system  of 
assessing  real  estate,  the  publication  of  the  city's  financial  reports,  the 
placing  of  the  city  collector  under  bonds,  the  relaxation  of  a  rule  forbidding 
city  officials  to  take  municipal  contracts,  the  increase  of  an  appropriation 
for  street-paving,  the  building  of  a  city  hall,  and  the  fixing  of  work  hours 
for  city  employees. 


DIRECT    LEGISLATION  AND  THE   RECALL          331 

of  present-day  political  discussion  in  regard  to  which  differ- 
ences of  opinion  are  more  marked,  even  though  characterized 
by  entire  sincerity  on  both  sides.1  One  reason  for  this  is 
that  the  direct-legislation  propaganda  embodies  not  only  a_ 
policy  but  a  protest.  It  is  in  this  latter  capacity,  indeed, 
that  it  makes  its  strongest  appeal  in  certain  quarters  ;  for  it 
begins  with  the  assertion  that  the  present  machinery  of  legis- 
lation is  inadequate  and  cannot  be  made  satisfactory  other 
than  by  a  root-and-branch  reform.2  This  is  a  proposition 
which  at  once  challenges  dissent  ;  for  there  are  many  who  be- 
lieve that  ordinance-making  by  city  councils  and  law-making 
by  legislatures  have  not  by  any  means  deteriorated  to  a 
point  that  calls  for  the  application  of  drastic  remedies. 

That  widespread  dissatisfaction  with  the  ordinary  methods  The  condi 
of  legislation  exists  in  every  part  of  the  United  States  is 


scarcely  a  matter  for  serious  doubt.     In  the  larger  cities  lation 

to  remedy 

more  especially  the  inefficiency  of  municipal  councils  in  deal- 
ing with  the  simple  problems  of  legislation  which  come 
before  them  is  so  generally  acknowledged  as  to  make  men 
marvel  that  it  should  have  been  tolerated  so  long.  The 
only  reason  why  it  was  tolerated  for  so  many  years  is  be- 
cause public  opinion  permitted  itself  to  be  dominated  by  a 
faith  in  formulas,  and  hence  accepted  such  features  as 
the  separation  of  legislative  from  administrative  functions, 
the  bicameral  council,  the  ward  system,  the  party  designa- 
tion on  municipal  ballots,  and  many  other  demoralizing 
arrangements  as  inevitable  incidents  of  any  system  of  city 
government.  During  the  last  ten  years,  however,  popular 

1  Cf.,  for  instance,  E.  P.  Oberholtzer's  Initiative,  Referendum,  and  Recall 
in  America  (New  York,  1911),  and  D.  F.  Wilcox's  Government  by  All  the 
People  (New  York,  1912). 

2  See,  for  example,  the  address  of  Governor  Woodrow  Wilson  on  "The 
Issues  of  Reform,"  printed  in  the  volume  of  selected  articles  entitled  The 
Initiative,  Referendum,  and  Recall  (ed.  W.  B.  Munro,  New  York,  1912), 
ch.  iii. 


332  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

interest  in  municipal  affairs  has  been  growing  more  active 
and  more  discriminating.  It  is  coming  to  be  intolerant  of  old 
formulas  and  impatient  of  slow-working  reforms.  The 
public  temper  has  reached  the  point  of  insisting  that  the 
means  shall  be  adjusted  to  the  endf  and  it  seems  to  care  little 
whether  these  means  are  orthodox  or  not.  For  the  most  part 
it  finds  the  old  machinery  inadequate  for  the  effective  expres- 
sion of  the  new  consensus,  and  the  result  is  an  impatient 
demand  for  channels  through  which  popular  sovereignty 
may  fully  and  directly  assert  itself.  When  a  considerable 
element  among  the  voters  assumes  this  attitude,  it  is  idle  to 
argue  that  for  the  flaws  of  representative  democracy  the 
people  are  themselves  in  the  last  resort  to  blame.  As  a 
syllogism  of  political  science  that  is  true  enough ;  but  as  a 
matter  of  fact  it  is  no  more  true  than  is  the  maxim  of  prac- 
tical politics  that  the  voters  will  never  blame  themselves 
for  a  failure  to  get  what  they  desire. 

Popular  Public  interest  in  what  is  going  on  at  the  city  hall  having 

wtti?tiiieoid  become  much  more  active  in  every  American  municipality 
machinery.  durmg  the  last  f  ew  years,  the  shortcomings  of  the  old  munici- 
pal system  have  been  more  apparent,  and  the  electorate  has 
in  many  cases  awakened  to  the  fact  that  it  has  been  tolerating 
a  mere  travesty  of  popular  government.  Conditions  which 
have  been  shown  to  exist  in  dozens  of  municipalities  afford 
abundant  evidence  that  the  people  have  not  been  actually 
in  control  of  their  local  representatives,  and  have  not  been 
getting  from  them  the  service  that  representatives  are 
supposed  to  supply.  The  absolute  domination  of  many 
city  councils  by  organized  interests,  whether  political  or  eco- 
nomic, has  been  established  beyond  the  slightest  reasonable 
doubt.  It  would,  indeed,  be  a  matter  for  some  surprise  if 
the  situation  had  turned  out  otherwise.  Under  a  system 
which  for  so  long  a  period  permitted  councilmen  to  be  nomi- 
nated in  party  caucuses  and  elected  by  wards  on  ballots  de- 


DIRECT  LEGISLATION  AND   THE   RECALL          333 

signed  at  every  turn  to  mislead  the  voters,  there  was  no  good 
reason  for  expecting  any  better  type  of  councilman  than  the 
sort  which  most  cities  obtained.  And  since  these  council- 
men  and  other  elective  officers  of  city  government  were  set 
to  do  their  work  under  a  procedure  which  rendered  all  real 
localization  of  responsibility  impossible  and  precluded  all 
opportunity  for  the  development  of  effective  leadership,  the 
actual  democracy  of  city  government  very  naturally  became, 
in  perhaps  the  majority  of  American  cities,  little  more  than 
a  pleasant  fiction.  The  real  work  of  framing  ordinances  came 
to  be  performed  at  the  party  headquarters,  or  at  clandestine 
conferences  between  a  few  political  leaders  and  the  represent- 
atives of  public-service  corporations,  rather  than  by  the 
council  as  a  whole.1 

The  specific  remedies  for  this  situation  were  long  ago  The  milder 
pointed  out  by  students  of  municipal  government,  but  only 
within  the  last  ten  or  twelve  years  have  their  reiterated  pro- 
tests been  able  to  make  much  impression  upon  the  public 
mind.  For  many  years  even  the  plea  for  the  abolition  of 
party  designations  upon  the  municipal  ballot  came  as  a  voice 
crying  in  the  wilderness.  It  is,  in  fact,  only  since  about  1900 
that  whole-hearted  attempts  have  been  made  to  clear  the 
representative  system  of  the  various  clogs  which  have  im- 
peded its  proper  working;  and  it  is  only  within  the  last  half- 
dozen  years  that  representative  democracy  has  had  a  fair 
and  free  trial  in  any  large  city  of  the  United  States.  The 
reduction  of  municipal  councils  in  size,  the  use  of  non-partisan 
nomination  methods,  the  introduction  of  the  short  ballot 
without  party  designations,  the  simplification  of  council 
procedure,  —  all  these  features  are  essential  to  popular 
control  of  municipal  legislatures;  yet  cities  that  possess 
charters  embodying  all  of  them  are  still  in  the  minority. 

1  Many  specific  instances  illustrating  this  situation  are  given  in  F.  C. 
Howe's  The  City,  the  Hope  of  Democracy  (New  York,  1905),  ch.  vi. 


334  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

Where  these  features  have  gained  recognition,  the  results 
have  been  sufficient  to  warrant  the  hope  that  most  of  the 
unresponsiveness  to  public  opinion  which  has  characterized 
municipal  government  in  this  country  can  be  eradicated 
without  recourse  to  direct  legislation.  But  piecemeal  reform 
takes  time  and  requires  patience,  more  of  both,  perhaps, 
than  the  voters  of  many  cities  seem  in  their  present  temper 
ready  to  supply.  In  the  last  analysis,  the  movement  for 
installing  jhe  initiative  and  referendum  as  normal  agencies  of 
local  legislation  is  an  evidence  of  growing  public  impatience 
with  all  measures  of  municipal  reform  which  come  in  homoeo- 
pathic doses.  In  this  respect  public  opinion  seems  to  have 
moved  forward  more  rapidly  during  the  last  ten  years  than 
it  did  during  the  preceding  fifty. 

The  first  argument  in  favor  of  direct  legislation  rests, 
accordingly,  upon  the  allegation  that  existing  methods  of^ 
framing  municipal  policy  secure  unsatisfactory  results; 
that  representatives  do  not  and  cannot  under  present 
arrangements  represent  the  wishes  of  those  who  go  through 
the  form  of  electing  them ;  and  that  this  situation  is  not 
likely  to  be  fundamentally  altered  save  by  piercing  the  vitals 
i.  Repre-  of  the  old  system.  To  make  representative  democracy 
government  fulfil  its  professed  functions,  it  is  urged,  the  electorate 
mad°tbe  should  use  the  weapons  which  direct  democracy  supplies. 
gut  the  sponsors  of  the  initiative  and  referendum  do  not  rest 
their  whole  case,  or  even  a  large  part  of  it,  upon  this  line 
of  argument.  They  go  much  farther,  by  claiming  for  their 
proposals  many  positive  merits  which  do  not  connect 
themselves  with  the  faults  of  a  purely  representative  system. 
They  lay  stress,  for  instance,  upon  the  educative  value  of_ 
direct-legislation  machinery.  By  means  of  initiative  peti- 
tions, they  tell  us,  a  spirit  of  legislative  enterprise  is  pro- 
moted among  the  voters ;  men  are  encouraged  to  formulate 
projects  of  their  own,  and  to  discuss  the  projects  of  others 


DIRECT  LEGISLATION  AND   THE   RECALL          335 

as  soon  as  they  are  broached.  Proposals  emanating  from 
any  quarter  are  sure  to  get  their  due  share  of  public 
attention,  and  a  fair  hearing  as  well.  If  the  city's  interests 
often  suffer  from  the  apathy  of  all  but  the  professional  politi- 
cians, if  the  great  body  of  municipal  voters  display  little  inter- 
est in  the  making  of  ordinances  or  the  granting  of  franchises 
or  the  incurring  of  indebtedness,  this  state  of  things  has  been 
brought  about,  we  are  told,  by  the  feeling  of  utter  helplessness 
which  the  workings  of  the  old  system  have  ingrained  in  the 
public  mind. 

To  some  extent,  at  least,  this  line  of  reasoning  leads  to  a  Awakes 
proposition  that  can  adduce  much  evidence  in  its  behalf.  est  in  local 
Without  doubt  the  enlightened  element  in  the  citizenship  of  meaaures- 
many  municipalities  is  to-day  denuded  of  all  interest  in_ 
city  administration  through  sheer  discouragement.  Public- 
spirited  men  have  so  often  endeavored  to  make  their  reason- 
able projects  materialize  into  action,  they  have  so  often 
been  able  to  demonstrate  that  popular  sentiment  is  with 
them,  and  yet  have  so  regularly  failed  to  make  any  sub- 
stantial headway  against  well-intrenched  politicians,  that 
many  of  them  the  country  over  have  withdrawn  in  disgust 
from  all  participation  in  the  affairs  of  their  own  communi- 
ties, thereby  abandoning  the  field  to  those  who  are  of  all  ele- 
ments in  the  electorate  the  least  prolific  of  progressive  ideas. 
It  may  be  suggested  that  those  who  thus  quit  the  arena 
are  deficient  in  civic  patriotism;  but,  even  if  that  charge 
be  true,  it  does  not  offer  any  solution  of  the  problem. 
One  can  hardly  expect  to  turn  the  indifference  of  any  elec- 
tprai^lement  into  active  interest  by  taunting  it  with  a  lack. 
of  fighting  spirit  when  it  declines  to  wage  political  warfare 
upon  grossly  unequal  terms.  Men  as  a  rule  put  forth  ideas, 
and  come  out  actively  in  support  of  them,  only  when  there 
is  a  chance  that  these  ideas  may  some  day  be  carried  to 
fruition.  Such  chance,  it  is  claimed,  the  machinery  of 


336  GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 

direct  legislation  guarantees.  Political  thought  and  discus- 
sion can  be  stimulated  among  all  classes  by  the  assurance 
that  any  public  project,  whatever  its  nature,  can  be  sentenced 
to  oblivion  only  by  the  direct  verdict  of  the  people.  The 
way  to  get  the  voter  interested  in  measures,  we  are  told,  is  to 
ask  for  his  opinion  upon  measures,  not  for  his  opinion  upon 
men.  The  way  to  stimulate  him  to  active  participation 
in  the  framing  of  municipal  policy  is  to  submit  all  important 
proposals  to  him  in  person,  and  not  to  some  one  who  merely 
holds  his  proxy.  The  way  to  educate  him  in  political 
science  is  to  give  him  tasks  which  cannot  be  performed 
properly  without  knowledge.  The  educative  value  of  the 
ordinary  ballot,  where  the  suffrage  has  been  granted  to  all, 
has  been  so  fully  demonstrated  both  in  America  and  elsewhere 
that  it  is  nowadays  rarely  questioned.  To  enhance  this 
value  by  making  the  ballot  a  more  comprehensive  political 
catechism  is  what  the  friends  of  direct  legislation  are  now 
trying  to  do.  At  all  events,  they  urge,  the  initiative  and 
referendum  are  agencies  through  which  the  voter  can  be  made 
to  realize  that  he  is  a  sovereign  in  fact  as  well  as  in  name, 
that  his  responsibility  is  ultimate  and  cannot  be  shifted, 
and  that  there  are  no  concealed  obstacles  to  the  progress  of 
any  proposal  which  he  may  wish  to  put  forth  as  his  own.1 
HOW  pub-  In  harmony  with  the  stress  laid  upon  the  educative  value 
secured.  °f  direct  democracy,  some  of  the  states  and  cities  which  have 
adopted  the  initiative  and  referendum  provide  for  the  print- 
ing and  distribution  of  information  in  regard  to  the  various 
questions  submitted  to  the  voter  upon  his  ballot.  This 
information  is  issued  in  pamphlet  form,  and  precautions  are 
taken  to  insure  the  publication  of  arguments  both  for  and 

1  For  a  full  discussion  of  this  feature,  see  the  paper  on  "  Direct  Legisla- 
tion" by  Professor  L.  J.  Johnson,  printed  in  the  volume  of  selected  articles 
entitled  The  Initiative,  Referendum,  and  Recall  (ed.  W.  B.  Munro,  New 
York,  1912),  ch.  vi. 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION  AND   THE   RECALL  337 

against  the  projected  measure,  equal  space  being  allowed 
to  advocates  and  opponents.  A  copy  of  the  pamphlet, 
which  thus  becomes  a  symposium  of  views,  is  mailed  to  every 
enrolled  voter,  in  the  expectation  that  he  will  give  it  study 
and  thereby  put  himself  in  a  position  to  render  an  intelligent 
verdict  at  the  polls.  In  addition  to  these  official  pamphlets 
and  supplementary  to  them,  various  city  organizations, 
such  as  good  government  associations  or  voters'  leagues, 
put  forth  literature  on  their  own  behalf  with  a  view  to  giving 
the  voter  additional  guidance.1  Through  these  various 
channels  much  information  concerning  the  measures  to  be 
submitted  at  the  polls  is  literally  forced  ^pnn  the  voters.  Cfl/X  1( 
It  is  of  course  not  improbable  that,  notwithstanding  all 
this  pamphleteering,  a  great  many  of  them  will  remain  un- 
informed through  sheer  inertia ;  yet  it  will  hardly  be  denied 
that  the  majority  of  those  who  constitute  the  electorate  are 
likely  to  know  more  about  mooted  questions  of  public  policy 
if  they  are  provided  with  all  this  controversial  literature 
than  if  they  had  no  such  facilities  at  all.  There  ought  to 
be  no  doubt  in  the  minds  of  those  who  have  watched  the 
workings  of  direct  legislation  in  Western  cities  during  the 
last  few  years  that  this  system  does  foster  public  interest 
in  even  the  details  of  legislative  projects;  and  such  public 
interest  cannot  be  without  some  educative  value.  But 
whether  this  interest  will  wane  as  the  system  loses  its  novelty, 
and  whether  it,  after  all,  achieves  its  real  end  by  equipping 
the  voters  with  information  which  they  can  and  do  use 
profitably,  are  questions  that  cannot  be  fairly  answered 
at  this  stage  of  experience  with  the  new  machinery. 

It  is  sometimes  urged  that  the  use  of  direct  methods  of  3.  it 

increases 
popular 

1 A  good  example  of  this  type  of  political  literature  —  a  circular  issued   respect  for 
by  the  Taxpayers'  League  of  Portland,  Oregon,  for  the  city  election  of  thelaw' 
June,  1909  —  is  reprinted  in  the  Proceedings  of  the  National  Municipal 
League  for  1909,  pp.  320-325. 
z 


338  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

legislation  would  increase  popular  respect  for  the  law.  One, 
reason  why  people  often  manifest  a  deficient  regard  for  rules 
of  conduct  prescribed  either  by  statute  or  by  ordinance  may 
be  found  in  the  fact  that  many  of  such  regulations  do  not 
have  the  force  of  public  opinion  behind  them,  but  have  been 
framed  in  the  interest  of  some  influential  class  among  the 
electorate*  When  this  is  the  case,  it  is  very  difficult  to  en- 
force such  rules  properly.  The  close  and  necessary  relation 
between  law  and  public  opinion  in  all  well-ordered  com- 
munities is  something  not  to  be  gainsaid ;  it  is,  therefore, 
indispensable  that  popular  sympathy  should  be  clearly  in 
line  with  the  spirit  of  an  enactment  if  the  efficient  adminis- 
tration of  it  is  to  be  insured.  Measures  put  upon  the 
statute-book  by  means  of  the  initiative  and  referendum 
would,  of  course,  bear  on  their  face  the  stamp  of  specific  public 
indorsement,  and  from  this  very  fact,  it  is  contended,  might 
be  more  willingly  observed  by  the  people.  Respect  for  the 
law  has  also  suffered  somewhat  by  reason  of  the  fact  that  so 
many  measures  enacted  in  the  ordinary  way  bear  ample  testi- 
mony to  the  bad  faith  of  those  who  were  ostensibly  respon- 
sible for  their  passage.  The  prevalence  of  the  so-termed 
"  jokers,"  or  cunning  verbal  contrivances  for  defeating  the 
professed  purpose  of  a  law,  has  created  a  general  impression 
that  legislators  are  too  much  given  to  the  chicanery  of  taking 
away  with  the  left  hand  what  they  have  just  given  with  the 
right.  Measures  proposed  by  initiative  petition  may  some- 
times be  crude,  it  is  admitted :  but  they  may  at  least  be^ 
trusted  for  their  frankness  and  good  faith.  On  this  point  it 
is  interesting  to  compare  the  laws  that  have  been  adopted 
during  the  last  few  years  under  the  new  system  with  corre- 
sponding measures  earlier  enacted  by  the  legislature.  Those 
does* not  wno  *a^e  ^e  ^rouble  *°  make  this  comparison  will  readily 
result  in  ill-  discover  that,  for  clearness  of  phraseology,  conciseness,  and 
statutes,  general  conformance  to  the  accepted  rules  of  legal  drafting, 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION  AND  THE   RECALL          339 

the  products  of  direct  legislation  are  almost  uniformly  su- 
perior to  those  obtained  through  the  ordinary  channels  of 
representative  law-making.1  It  has  been  too  frequently 
taken  for  granted  that  proposals  which  originate  with  the 
voters  will  be  put  into  shape  for  the  ballot  by  amateurs  in 
the  art  of  legal  phrasing.  It  would  probably  be  more  in 
keeping  with  the  fact,  however,  to  say  that  this  is  just  what 
happens  in  the  case  of  most  measures  which  originate  in 
representative  bodies.  The  councilman  or  the  council 
committee  that  undertakes  to  frame  an  ordinance  will  with 
reasonable  certainty  make  a  botch  of  the  task.  Prudent 
councilmen  seek  the  expert  aid  of  the  city's  law  department 
in  such  matters;  and  those  who  are  interested  in  securing 
the  popular  adoption  of  measures  initiated  by  petition  take 
similar  precautions.  The  chief  difference  seems  to  be  that 
the  legal  skill  employed  in  the  latter  case  is  superior  to  that 
commonly  found  in  a  city  solicitor's  office. 

Among  the  objections  urged  against  the  system  of  direct  Arguments 
legislation  in  municipal  government  three  or  four  come  for-  j-^f* 
ward  most  frequently.     One  is  the  assertion  that  the  system  legislation, 
is  antagonistic  to  the  basic  principles  of  representative  gov- 
ernment,2 that  the  regular  use  of  it  would  deprive  the  council- 
men  of  all  due  sense  of  responsibility,  and  the  result  would 
Boon  manifest  itself  in  a  further  deterioration  of  the  council's 
ordinary  work;    that  it  would,  furthermore,  eliminate  the 
mayoral  veto,  and  in  taking  away  this  power  would  free  the 
mayor  from  all  responsibility  in  the  most  important  matters 

1  That  "the  atrocious  grammar  and  painful  obscurities  to  be  found  in 
the  texts  .  .  .  are,  with  few  exceptions,    [in]   legislative,  not  initiative, 
measures,"  is  the  conclusion  of  those  who  have  gone  carefully  through  a 
great  deal  of  this  material.    See  C.  A.  Beard  and  B.  E.  Shultz,  Documents 
on  the  Slate-wide  Initiative,  Referendum,  and  Recall  (New  York,  1912),  p.  vi. 

2  See  the  article  on  "Representative  as  against  Direct  Government"  by 
Congressman  Samuel  W.  McCall,  in  Atlantic  Monthly,  October,  1911 ; 
and  the  reply  by  Senator  Jonathan  Bourne,  Jr.,  ibid.,  January,  1912. 


340  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

i.  it  impairs  brought  before  the  city  government.    Poorer  councilmen  and 

of  represent-    POOrer  mayors,  it  is  pre^ififrHJ)    wrmlrl   h 


ativeflt  come.  Now,  this  is  an  objection  which  cannot  be  lightly 
set  aside  ;  for,  if  there  is  any  maxim  that  American  political 
experience  seems  to  establish,  it  is  the  doctrine  which  closely 
relates  the  quality  of  elective  officials  to  the  degree  of  final 
power  committed  to  them.  For  a  half-century  or  more  the 
decline  in  the  personnel  of  municipal  councils  has  gone  stei) 
by  step  with  the  reduction  of  the  local  powers  intrusted  to 
these  bodies.  When  the  selection  of  incompetent  officials 
does  not  bring  substantial  penalties  upon  the  people  in  the 
shape  of  heavier  tax-rates,  or  of  increased  indebtedness,  or 
in  some  other  visible  form,  men  of  such  stamp  are  very 
likely  to  find  their  way  into  office;  for  municipal  councils 
cannot  be  shorn  of  their  powers  without  the  result  showing 
itself  in  a  slackened  popular  interest  at  council  elections 
and  a  consequent  increase  in  the  ease  with  which  men  of 
small  caliber  can  secure  places  at  the  council-board.  That, 
at  any  rate,  has  been  the  history  of  the  American  city  coun- 
cil during  the  last  fifty  years  ;  and  the  chief  reason  why  this 
body  to-day  attracts  to  its  membership  so  few  men  of  any 
capacity  or  public  experience  or  business  standing  is  because 
it  has  in  many  cities  ceased  to  be  a  coordinate  branch  of 
the  municipal  government.1  Deprived  of  its  more  important 
administrative  functions  and  restricted  to  sundry  tasks  of 
minor  legislation,  the  average  city  council  no  longer  attracts 
the  type  of  man  that  it  drew  into  its  membership  a  genera- 
tion or  two  ago. 

importance       Now,  the  policy  of  direct  legislation  proposes  that  all  the 

queetion.       organs  of  contemporary  city  government  shall  have  their 

final  authority  diminished  still  more;    and  if  this  further 

depletion  of  powers  possessed  by  local  authorities  would  not 

conduce  to  a  further  decline  in  the  personnel  of  city  gov- 

1  See  above,  pp.  189-190. 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION  AND   THE    RECALL  341 

eminent,  then  five  or  six  decades  of  political  experience  have 
been  without  their  lessons.  It  is  well  enough  to  say  that  the 
initiative  and  referendum  concern  themselves  with  measures 
and  have  nothing  to  do  with  men,  but  in  local  government 
measures  and  men  cannot  be  so  easily  swept  into  separate 
orbits.  The  kind  of  man  that  the  voters  will  elect  must 
depend  somewhat  upon  the  measures  which  he  is  expected 
to  consider  in  his  official  capacity.  All  public  measures 
are  human  products  and  reflect  the  quality  of  those  who 
give  them  official  adoption.  How  far  direct  legislation  would 
react  upon  the  powers  and  the  personnel  of  elective  officials 
becomes,  accordingly,  a  question  of  very  great  importance 
unless  one  is  prepared  to  eliminate  the  representative 
system  altogether. 

But,  it  is  contended,  the  direct  merits  of  the  new  system  The  answer 
in  the  way  of  positive  legislation  would  in  any  event  be  found  argument, 
to  outweigh  this  objection.  What  representative  democracy 
might  lose,  direct  democracy  would  gain ;  for  the  real  test  qf 
efficient  legislation  in  a  democracy  is  its  popularity.  It 
matters  little  how  patiently  or  how  honestly  a  statute  or  an 
ordinance  may  be  framed  by  elected  representatives  of  the 
people ;  it  is  not  a  good  measure  unless  it  embodies  what  the 
greater  number  of  the  people  desire.  Judged  from  that 
point  of  view,  there  have  been  a  great  many  unsatisfactory 
ordinances  in  American  cities.  Who  would  urge,  for  ex- 
ample, that  ordinances  granting  franchises  in  the  city  streets 
have  in  any  large  measure  reflected  the  wishes  of  the  com- 
munity ?  This  indifference  to  public  sentiment,  it  is  alleged, 
results  not  only  from  the  fact  that  city  councils  are  deficient 
in  men  of  representative  character,  but  from  the  additional 
fact  that  the  councilmen  have  in  many  instances  failed  to 
apprehend  the  real  functions  of  a  representative.  They 
have  not  sought  diligently  to  ascertain  the  sentiment  of  the 
voters,  and  they  have  not  always  responded  to  it  when  they 


342  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

saw  its  drift  well  enough.  The  only  ordinances  that  can 
be  trusted  to  mirror  public  opinion  with  entire  fidelity  are, 
accordingly,  those  which  the  people  themselves  frame  and 
enact  directly.  These,  we  are  told,  will  constitute  repre- 
sentative legislation  in  the  true  sense.  In  other  words, 
the  choice  is  asserted  to  be  between  representative  legisla- 
tion secured  directly  and  unrepresentative  legislation  ob- 
tained by  the  old  indirect  channels. 

where  the  The  flaw  in  arguments  of  this  type  can  usually  be  found 
in  the  ill-grounded  assumption  that  the  popular  will  is  identi- 
cal with  whatever  the  ballot-box  may  disclose  under  any 
circumstances,  a  delusion  which  is  at  least  as  old  as  the 
age  of  Rousseau.  The  decision  of  a  majority  of  a  minority 
among  the  voters  ("which  is  what  a  referendum  very  often 
secures)  is  not  an  expression  of  the  p^n^ra!  will-  To  allege 
tnat  it  would  be  a  true  expression  if  substantially  all  the 
voters  would  go  to  the  polls,  study  the  questions  put  before 
them,  and  render  a  judicious  verdict,  does  not  in  any  way 
alter  the  fact.  As  well  might  one  reply  to  criticisms  upon 
the  representative  system  by  alleging  that  the  agencies 
which  it  provides  would  invariably  insure  a  genuine  ex- 
pression of  popular  desires  in  the  way  of  legislation  if  the 
voters  would  only  select  the  best  men  of  the  community, 
and  if  these  men  would  only  remain  unswervingly  faithful 
to  the  trust  imposed  in  them.  Representative  and  direct 
legislation  merely  use  different  machinery  for  securing  the 
same  professed  ends.  In  neither  case  is  the  machinery 
able,  in  actual  practice,  to  show  much  approach  to  perfec- 
tion. Under  either  system  the  results  obtained  depend  so 
largely  upon  the  political  habits  and  traditions  of  the  elec- 
torate that  to  leave  these  things  out  of  account  is  to  neglect 
the  key  to  the  whole  problem. 

It  has  frequently  been  asserted  that  the  presumable  eager- 
ness of  persons  to  put  their  names  upon  anything  that  is 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION  AND   THE   RECALL          343 

in  the  nature  of  a  petition  will  make  it  easy  for  hobby-riders  2.  it 
to  obtain,  at  public  expense  and  inconvenience,  considera- 


tion  for  all  sorts  of  profitless  measures  ;  and  it  is  true  that  ?f  Prpmot- 

ing  class 

some  Western  cities  have  not  been  at  all  careful  in  the  use  legislation. 
of  the  initiative  during  the  first  few  years  following  its  es- 
tablishment. As  every  element  in  a  community  has  its 
own  axe  to  grind,  the  quest  for  signatures  naturally  gets  all 
the  momentum  of  a  selfish  propaganda.  If  the  proposal 
has  to  do  with  the  immediate  interests  of  any  organized  fac- 
tion, such  as  a  labor  union,  a  public-service  corporation,  a 
political  machine,  or  a  racial  or  religious  element,  the  machin- 
ery for  setting  an  initiative  petition  in  motion  is  readily 
at  hand.  If,  however,  it  touches  the  pockets  or  the  preju- 
dices of  none  of  these,  but  merely  relates  to  the  general 
good  of  the  everyday  citizen  who  has  no  particular  organiza- 
tion to  champion  his  cause,  the  task  of  promoting  direct 
legislation  is  liable  to  prove  a  difficult  one  involving  con- 
siderable expense.  Whether  a  system  which  thus  puts  a 
premium  upon  projects  that  interest  an  organized  portion 
of  the  electorate  and  a  discount  upon  the  advancement  of 
those  which  affect  closely  only  the  unaffiliated  citizen  can 
ultimately  lead  to  better  things  in  local  legislation,  is  a 
question  well  worth  raising.1 

If  the  privilege  of  initiating  measures  by  popular  petition  3.  it  puts 
is  used  freely,  it  means  either  that  special  elections  must 

1  An  interesting  commentary  on  this  point  is  afforded  by  the  actual 
workings  of  the  Boston  system  of  nominating  municipal  candidates  by 
petitions  bearing  5000  names.  Such  petitions,  when  circulated  among 
city  employees,  or  at  the  meetings  of  labor  unions,  or  among  those  who 
are  in  the  employ  of  public-service  corporations,  soon  gather  their  necessary 
quota.  Likewise,  organizations  that  are  ready  to  pay  five  or  ten  cents 
per  signature  can  secure  men  to  make  canvass  for  names.  But  when 
a  candidate  has  neither  an  organization  nor  funds  to  help  him,  he  finds  the 
requirement  of  5000  signatures  (which  is  less  than  five  per  cent  of  the  reg- 
istered electorate)  a  task  of  greater  difficulty  than  most  men  would  sup- 
pose it  to  be. 


voter. 


344 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


be  held  at  frequent  intervals  or  that  the  regular  annual 
ballot  must  bear  a  formidable  list  of  queries.     In  the  first 
case  the  vote  is  liable  to  be  so  small  that  a  majority  of  it 
will  not  be  a  true  index  of  popular  convictions.     This  fea--_ 
ture  has  been  characteristic  of  special  elections  everywhere.. 


Voters  will 
not  person- 
ally inform 
themselves 
concerning 
questions. 


n  the  other  hand,  if  many  questions  are  submitted  to  the 
voters  at  the  regular  elections,  the  task  thereby  imposed  upon 
them  is  likely  to  prove  too  intricate  and  burdensome  to  be 
carefully  performed.  On  the  eve  of  an  election  the  average 
voter  gives  just  about  so  much  time  and  thought  to  political 
matters.  If  he  has  thirty  questions  to  attend  to,  he  is  apt 
to  give  no  more  of  his  consideration  to  the  lot  than  he  would 
give  to  three.  More  than  likely,  too,  he  will  adopt  the  prac- 
tice of  turning  for  guidance  to  those  organizations  with  which 
he  is  affiliated,  whether  these  be  political  machines,  labor 
unions,  or  business  bodies.  This,  at  any  rate,  is  what 
voters  have  already  shown  themselves  ready  to  do  in  cities 
that  have  put  numerous  questions  on  the  ballot.  In  such 
circumstances  the  real  voting  is  done  not  by  the  voters,  but 
by  the  political  committees,  the  taxpayers'  leagues,  the 
labor  locals,  and  the  other  associations  which  instruct  their 
respective  members  how  to  vote.  These  bodies  issue  cir- 
culars containing  categorical  directions  which  the  voters 
are  expected  to  take  with  them  to  the  polls.  In  one  case 
the  politicians  provided  each  of  their  followers  with  a  sheet 
of  limp  cardboard  cut  the  exact  size  of  the  ballot,  with  holes 
punched  in  it  at  appropriate  places.  The  voter,  by  laving 
this  card  over  his  ballot  and  marking  a  cross  in  each  hole, 
thereby  recorded  himself  just  as  the  politicians  desired,  and 
that  without  even  reading  his  ballot-paper.  This  is  no 
doubt  an  extreme  instance  ;  but  it  proves,  at  any  rate,  that 
voters  do  not  need  to  study  the  questions  submitted  to  them 
unless  they  desire  to  do  so_.  Indeed,  the  experience  of  Ameri- 
can cities  as  regards  the  docility  of  large  elements  among  the 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION   AND   THE   RECALL  345 

voters  scarcely  justifies  the  hope  that  electoral  independence 

will  ever  be  secured  by  means  of  a  system  which  does  not 

virtually  compel  it.     Much  has  been  said  as  to  the  way  in 

which  the  old  ballot,  by  its  plethora  of  candidates,  dis- 

couraged independent  voting;    and  the  short   ballot   has 

been  aggressively,  and  rather  successfully,  put  before  us  as 

a  means  of  making  representative  democracy  efficient  by 

the  removal  of  this  handicap.1     But  will  it  avail  much  if,  in  Relation  of 

taking  off  the  names  of  thirty  or  forty  candidates,  we  re-  latfon  tcfthe 


place  them  by  an  equal  number  of  set  questions  ?  A  ballot 
which  asks  for  more  information  than  the  average  voter  is 
able  to  supply  intelligently  and  of  his  own  resources  is  un- 
wieldy. Moreover,  it  makes  little  difference  whether  the 
information  concerns  candidates  or  matters  of  policy;  the 
ballot  is  not  a  satisfactory  one  if  iti  encourages  the  voter  to 
accept  directions  as  to  how  he  shall  mark  it. 

It  has  been  pointed  out,  furthermore,  that  a  referendum  4.  The 
is  no  more  than  a  call  for  the  yeas  and  nays,  and  that  a  "best  so™ 


categorical  answer  to  any  general  question  is  rarely  a  true 

one.     The  new  system  assumes  that  all  voters  are  ready  to  expression 

••••••-•••  "  "  of  popular 

record  themselves  definitely  for  or  against  a  project  in  exactly  opinion. 
the  form  in  which  it  appears  on  their  ballots.  This  is  far 
from  being  the  case,  however.  Few  men  hold  unqualified 
opinions  on  great  questions  of  public  policy,  and  those  who 
do  are  apt  to  be  the  ones  least  given  to  serious  thought  upon 
such  matters.  When  a  majority  of  the  electorate  rejects  a 
proposal  at  the  polls,  this  does  not  necessarily  mean  that  a 
majority  is  opposed  to  such  proposal  in  its  general  outlines. 
More  than  likely  it  means  that  the  majority  contains  many 
who  find  objections  to  the  details  of  the  project.  With 
a  little  compromise  the  measure  might  have  secured 

1  See,  for  example,  C.  A.  Beard  on  "The  Ballot's  Burden"  in  Political 
Science  Quarterly,  December,  1909;  and  R.  S.  Childs,  Short  Ballot 
Principles  (Boston,  1911). 


346  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

a  verdict  in  its  favor.  Now,  this  opportunity  for 
compromise,  for  discrimination  between  essentials  and 
details,  and  for  the  elaboration  of  measures  which  seem 
to  serve  the  greatest  good  of  the  greatest  number,  is 
just  what  representative  machinery  provides  and  the 
mechanism  of  direct  legislation  fails  to  supply.  We  are 
often  told  that  the  orthodox  ballot  is  deficient  in  that  it 
asks  the  voter  to  pass  upon  candidates  in  a  narrow 
way,  —  that  it  asks  him  to  designate  his  first  choice  for  an 
office,  and  no  more.  The  preferential  ballot  is,  therefore, 
urged  into  use  because  it  records  all  shades  of  opinion  among 
the  voters,  because  it  gives  them  an  opportunity  to  say 
something  more  than  yes  or  no  to  the  claims  of  candidates. 
But  is  a  simple  cross  in  the  affirmative  or  the  negative  col- 
umn any  less  open  to  this  criticism  when  set  opposite 
a  question  than  when  marked  against  the  name  of  a 
candidate?  Electoral  opinions  vary  as  much  in  regard  to 
measures  as  they  do  in  regard  to  candidates.  The  objection 
made  to  the  categorical  ballot,  that  the  technical  result  of 
the  poll  may  be  far  from  indicating  the  actual  attitude  of 
the  voters,  seems  to  apply  with  equal  force  no  matter 
what  the  purport  of  the  ballot  may  be. 

5.  Voters          A  study  of  the  results  of  municipal  referenda  in  America 

actuated  by   shows  that  prejudice  and  capri™  nft.Pn  takft  t%  pWg  of 

ere°udice      judgment  in  determining  the  action  of  voters  at  the  polls. 

or  caprice.     It  is  well  known  to  politicians  who  have  kept  closely  in 

touch  with  such  matters  that  the  affirmative  side  of  any 

question  submitted  to  the  voters  has  a  distinct  advantage 

over  the  negative.     Hence  there  has  sometimes  been  a  good 

deal  of  jockeying  between  the  supporters  and  the  opponents 

of   a  question  as  to  the  form  of  phrasing  it.1     Just  why 

1  An  interesting  illustration  of  this  feature  was  afforded  in  a  well-known 
New  England  city  at  the  election  of  1911.  The  voters  were  asked  on  their 
ballots  whether  they  were  in  favor  of  the  erection  of  a  city  hospital.  By  a 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION  AND  THE   RECALL          347 

the  voters  should  display  this  rather  curious  illustration 
of  electoral  caprice  it  is  not  altogether  easy  to  explain,  but 
those  who  best  know  voters  and  their  ways  readily  testify 
to  its  invariable  existence.  The  affirmative  seems,,  in  fact, 
to  have  a  bonus  similar  to  that  enioved  by  the  candi-_ 
date  whose  name  appears  at  the  top  of  the  ballot.  Nor  is 
this  the  only  capricious  tendency  which  experience  with  the 
municipal  referendum  discloses.  It  is  well  known,  for  in-  Some 
stance,  that  voters  carry  with  them  into  the  polling-booth 
a  substantial  antipathy  to  public-service  corporations  and 
capitalistic  interests  in  general.  The  average  voter  is  apt 
to  register  his  voice  against  anything  that  looks  like  a  con- 
cession to  this  quarter.  A  cry  against  special  privilege  in 
any  of  its  forms  is  one  pf  fihp  *>«>«"' Q°+.  f^  raisef  and  when 
raised  it  usually  has  considerable  effect.  It  may  be,  of 
course,  that  this  anti-corporation  prejudice  among  the  voters 
is  the  fruit  of  corporate  misdoings,  that  corporate  interests 
by  their  reckless  disregard  of  public  opinion  have  brought 
it  upon  themselves.  But  even  if  this  be  true,  it  does  not 
alter  the  fact  that  prejudice  exists,  nor  does  it  change  the 
principle  that  government  by  prejudice  is  not  safe  govern- 
ment. It  must  be  remembered  that,  where  large  property 
interests  are  concerned,  measures  which  seem  to  be  legis- 
lative in  form  are  often  adjudicative  in  effect.  Without 
the  tempering  hand  of  the  state  upon  it,  the  free  use  of 
direct  legislation  in  cities  might  well  tend  to  render  property 
rights  insecure. 

majority  of  about  800  they  replied  in  the  affirmative.  It  was  originally 
arranged  that  they  should  also  be  asked  whether  they  would  authorize 
the  borrowing  of  funds  for  the  purpose  "outside  the  debt  limit."  The 
opponents  of  the  project,  however,  managed  to  have  the  wording  of  the 
second  question  changed  so  as  to  read  "within  the  debt  limit."  As  the 
city's  borrowing  capacity  within  the  debt  limit  was  already  about  ex- 
hausted, the  affirmative  of  the  proposition  thus  stated  an  obvious  impossi- 
bility. By  this  device  the  voters  were  almost  led  to  retract  in  their  answer 
to  the  second  question  the  decision  which  they  had  passed  upon  the  first. 


348  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

What  The  two  fields  in  which  American  cities  have  had  most 

experience  experience  with  the  referendum  are  the  regulation  of  the 
thTmatter  ncluor  trade  and  the  borrowing  of  money.  The  application 
of  referenda.  of  the  local-option  policy  to  the  sale  of  intoxicants  usually 
means  that  the  voters  of  the  town  or  city  must  each  year  de- 
cide directly  at  the  polls  the  question  whether  licenses  shall 
or  shall  not  be  granted  in  the  municipality.  This  question 
is  so  comparatively  simple  that,  barring  radical  changes  in  the 
composition  of  the  electorate,  the  answer  of  the  voters  to  it 
ought  not  to  be  different  from  year  to  year  if  the  votes  re- 
corded upon  it  really  represented  the  matured  convictions 
of  those  who  cast  them.  But  the  gyrations  of  local  policy 
in  this  field  have  been  so  marked  that  they  are  commonly 
spoken  of  as  "waves"  of  prohibition  or  anti-prohibition 
sentiment.  If  any  branch  of  local  policy  has  been  the  play- 
thing of  passing  gusts  in  the  public  temper,  it  is  that  which 
relates  to  the  regulation  of  the  liquor  traffic.  In  the  matter 
of  municipal  borrowing,  in  the  second  place,  a  large  experi- 
ence in  city  affairs  has  proved  the  unreliability  of  the  refer- 
endum as  a  means  of  securing  prudent  action.  The  partial- 
ity of  the  voters  for  measures  that  propose  to  pay  for  public 
improvements  by  loans  rather  than  out  of  current  taxes 
has  been  demonstrated  time  and  again  the  country  over.1 
It  is  only  natural  that  men  should  desire  to  have  present 
conveniences  paid  for  by  future  generations;  hence,  when 

1  "At  a  recent  election  on  the  question  of  borrowing  a  large  sum  of 
money  in  Philadelphia,  to  be  applied  to  improvements  in  different  parts 
of  the  city,  purely  local  and  selfish  considerations  made  themselves  felt. 
Those  parts  of  the  city  which  were  to  be  directly  benefited  by  the  loan 
returned  large  majorities  for  it,  while  in  other  sections  it  was  viewed  with 
curious  indifference.  Not  a  few  electors,  upon  being  asked  how  they 
had  voted  on  the  proposition,  explained  in  all  seriousness  that  they  had 
cast  their  ballots  in  favor  of  the  bill  because  they  believed  it  would  put 
more  money  in  circulation  and  give  the  poor  a  chance  to  obtain  some  of 
it." — E.  P.  OBERHOLTZER,  The  Referendum,  Initiative,  and  Recall  in  Amer- 
ica (New  York,  1911),  282. 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION   AND   THE   RECALL          349 

the  voters  are  asked  whether  they  will  themselves  pay  the 
cost  of  a  public  improvement  or  let  their  grandchildren  do 
it,  their  answer  is  in  most  cases  not  difficult  to  forecast. 
It  used  to  be  thought  that,  since  municipal  councils  are  apt 
to  be  prodigal  of  the  city's  credit,  the  necessity  of  submitting 
all  loan  proposals  to  the  people  for  their  ratification  would 
prove  a  useful  safeguard  against  unnecessary  borrowing. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  however,  this  requirement  has  afforded 
no  security  of  any  account;  if  anything,  it  has  rather  fa- 
vored undue  borrowing  by  making  no  one  responsible 
for  it. 

Nor  do  the  foregoing  examples  exhaust  the  list  of  matters 
in  regard  to  which  voters  have  shown  themselves  prone  to 
be  actuated  by  passing  waves  of  opinion,  or  by  purely  selfish 
motives  not  in  the  ultimate  interest  of  the  community, 
or  by  simple  prejudice  or  sheer  apathy.  Every  one  knows, 
for  example,  the  lenient  attitude  which  the  electorate  takes 
toward  those  who  hold  places  on  the  city's  pay-roll.  For 
securing  higher  pay,  fewer  hours  of  labor,  and  more  favor- 
able terms  of  service  the  referendum  has  proved  itself  a 
very  useful  agency.  The  public  feels  ill-inclined  to  stand 
out  against  the  demands  which  come  from  its  own  employees. 
That  is  why  policemen,  firemen,  and  others  who  press  their 
demands  upon  the  city  council  are  usually  willing  that 
the  matter  should  be  submitted  to  the  voters.  In  many 
cases,  too,  the  councilmen  are  no  less  willing ;  for  by  shifting 
their  own  responsibility  upon  the  people  in  this  way  they 
are  able  to  escape  the  odium  which  is  certain  to  come  from 
one  quarter  if  the  demands  are  granted  and  from  another  if 
they  are  refused.  Theco- 

When  one  comes  to  balance  the  various  merits  and  faults  various 
of  the  initiative  and  referendum  as  summed  up  in  the  fore-  arguments 

for  and 

going  pages,  one  finds  that  much  depends  upon  the  indi-  against 

•  in  •»  /r        i     i  i       •  i    i       T  ••  direct  legis- 

viduar  s  point  of  view.     Men  hold  widely  divergent  opinions,  iation. 


350 


GOVERNMENT   OF   AMERICAN   CITIES 


for  example,  concerning  the  extent  to  which  representative 
machinery  in  local  government  has  fallen  short  of  what  can 
reasonably  be  required  of  it;  yet  every  man's  attitude 
toward  direct  legislation  will  depend,  to  a  large  degree,  upon 
the  opinions  which  he  has  formed  on  this  question.  Much 
also  depends  upon  individual  temperament.  Those  who 
have  great  confidence  in  what  the  masses  of  the  voters  can 
do,  even  without  leadership  and  under  difficult  circum- 
stances, will  not  be  awed  by  practical  objections  to  direct- 
legislation  methods ;  but  it  is  an  interesting  fact  that  those 
who  have  had  most  to  do  with  political  affairs  are  not,  as  a 
rule,  sharers  in  this  feeling  of  great  confidence.  Since 
psychology  is  an  inductive  science,  its  application  to  people 
in  the  mass  can  only  be  understood  by  a  careful  and  pro- 
longed observation  of  the  electorate  when  it  acts  as  an 
individual  answering  yes  or  no  to  its  political  catechism  at 
the  polls.  On  this  point  the  next  decade  is  likely  to  teach 
us  a  great  deal. 

Linked  in  contemporary  discussion  with  the  initiative  and 
the  referendum  is  the  administrative  weapon  known  as  the 
recall.  This  may  be  defined  as  an  agency  through  which  an 
official  may  be  removed  from  his  post  before  the  end  of  his 
term.  Although  long  in  existence  in  some  of  the  Swiss 
cantons,  the  institution  is  novel  in  America,  having  first 
made  its  appearance  in  the  Populist  platforms  of  two  or  three 
decades  ago  under  the  somewhat  forbidding  name  of  "the 
imperative  mandate."  It  first  gained  official  recognition 
on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic  in  the  Los  Angeles  charter  of 
1903 ;  and  it  has  since  made  its  way  into  the  constitutions 
of  two  or  three  states,  into  the  general  laws  of  several  more, 
and  into  the  charters  of  more  than  one  hundred  cities,  most 
of  them  municipalities  that  have  adopted  the  commission 
form  of  city  government. 

In  practically  all  the  cities  that  have  established  the  re- 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION   AND   THE    RECALL  351 

call  procedure  the  provisions  relating  to  it  are  about  the  Machinery 
same.1  Ordinarily  it  applies  to  elective  officers  only,  but  "au. e 
in  some  cities  it  extends  its  scope  to  appointive  officials  as 
well.  The  movement  to  recall  an  officer  is  always  begun  by 
the  preparation  of  a  petition  which  sets  forth  charges  against 
him.  This  document,  when  it  has  been  signed  by  the  re- 
quired quota  of  qualified  voters,  is  presented  to  some  desig- 
nated municipal  officer,  usually  the  city  clerk.  The  quota 
necessary  is  from  fifteen  to  twenty-five  per  cent  of  the  total 
number  of  votes  polled  at  the  last  election;  in  a  few  cities 
it  is  even  higher.  The  signatures  having  been  verified  and 
counted  and  all  other  requirements  found  to  have  been  fully 
complied  with,  a  recall  election  is  ordered.  It  is  ordinarily 
provided  that  the  name  of  the  official  whose  removal  is 
sought  shall  appear  on  the  ballot  unless  he  requests  the 
contrary.  Other  candidates  for  the  office  may  be  put  in 
nomination  by  the  usual  methods.  So  far  as  polling-places, 
ballots,  and  general  arrangements  are  concerned,  the  recall 
election  is  conducted  like  any  regular  polling.  Unless  the 
official  who  has  been  holding  the  office  gets  the  highest  num- 
ber of  votes  among  the  several  candidates,  he  is  recalled; 
that  is,  he  vacates  his  post  forthwith,  and  the  balance  of 
his  term  is  filled  out  by  the  candidate  who  does  receive  the 
highest  vote.  To  prevent  an  abuse  of  the  recall  procedure, 
it  is  often  provided  that  no  removal  petition  may  be  filed 
until  an  officer  has  been  at  least  six  months  in  his  post,  and 


1  The  chief  exception  to  the  general  rule  is  Boston,  which  by  the  char- 
ter amendments  of  1909  established  a  modified  recall  system  in  con- 
nection with  the  mayoralty  (see  above,  pp.  213-214).  The  question  of 
recalling  the  mayor  appeared  on  the  ballots  in  November,  1911 ;  but  the 
majority  needed  to  effect  the  mayor's  removal  (more  than  one-half  of  the 
total  registered  vote)  was  not  forthcoming.  As  the  total  registered  vote 
in  Boston  is  about  110,000,  it  would  have  taken  55,000  affirmative  votes  to 
recall  the  mayor.  The  actual  result  stood  :  affirmative  37,262,  negative 
32,501. 


352 


GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Arguments 
in  its  favor. 


1.  It  keeps 
officials  re- 
sponsive to 
popular 
sentiment. 


that  thereafter  a  petition  may  not  be  set  in  motion  more 
than  once  in  any  year.1 

The  chief  argument  put  forth  in  favor  of  the  recall  is  its 
reputed  efficacy  as  a  means  of  retaining  popular  control  over 
men  installed  in  public  office.  Its  existence  is  a  standing 
reminder  to  the  office-holder  that  he  is  the  servant  and  not 
the  master  of  the  people.  It  compels  every  public  officer 
to  view  each  of  his  own  acts  in  the  light  of  the  effect  which 
it  will  have  upon  the  voters  at  large.  The  recall  provision 
is  based  upon  the  idea  that  the  relation  between  the  voters 
and  the  office-holder  is  that  of  principal  and  agent,  and  may 
logically  be  terminated  at  any  time  by  either  party.  An 
unbroken  responsiveness  of  all  officers  to  that  public  opinion 
which  is  supposed  to  govern  their  acts  (but  too  often  does 
not)  is  what  the  sponsors  of  the  recall  claim  for  it.2 

Now,  it  is  hardly  to  be  doubted  that  an  official  who  is  sub- 
ject to  the  recall  at  any  time  is  likely  to  be  more  deferential 
to  the  wishes  of  the  electorate  than  one  who  can  count  upon 
serving  out  his  full  term,  no  matter  how  unpopular  his  ser- 
vice may  be.  The  deference  of  the  office-seeker  to  public 
sentiment  is  proverbial ;  the  change  which  often  comes  over 
the  successful  candidate  after  he  gets  firmly  seated  in  his 
office  is  also  a  commonplace  of  American  political  life.  It  is 
the  aim  of  the  recall  provision  to  prevent  this  change  in  atti- 
tude, to  keep  the  official  in  that  frame  of  mind  which  he  pro- 
fessed as  a  candidate.  No  doubt  the  recall  can  accomplish 
this,  if  anything  can ;  but  that  is  not  the  only  point  at  issue. 
The  main  question  is  whether  responsiveness  to  public 

1  The  detailed  provisions,  as  applied  in  various  cities  may  be  found 
in  C.  A.  Beard's  Digest  of  Short  Ballot  Charters  (New  York,  1911).  A 
summary  of  the  laws  and  of  the  judicial  decisions  is  given  in  Comparative 
Legislation  Bulletin,  No.  12,  issued  by  the  Wisconsin  Free  Library  Com- 
mission. This  summary  is,  however,  complete  until  December,  1907, 
only. 

2  A  statement  of  the  arguments  in  favor  of  the  recall  may  be  found  in 
D.  F.  Wilcox's  Government  by  All  the  People  (New  York,  1912),  ch.  xxiv-xxvi. 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION   AND   THE    RECALL  353 

opinion  secured  in  this  way  is  not  gained  at  the  cost  of  the 
officer's  efficiency  in  the  discharge  of  his  duties.  When  an 
official  has  almost  no  other  function  than  that  of  representing 
his  constituents  (and  that  seems  to  be  the  only  rational  office 
of  councilmen  elected  from  wards),  the  recall  makes  a  strong 
case  in  its  own  favor.  But  there  are  many  city  officers  upon 
whom  is  laid  not  only  the  duty  of  reflecting  in  their  acts  the 
will  of  those  who  choose  them,  but  a  great  deal  more  than 
that.  In  all  its  administrative  departments  the  city  needs 
skill  and  judgment  no  less  than  it  needs  a  responsive  attitude ; 
it  is,  indeed,  upon  the  former  qualities  that  the  emphasis 
ought  to  be  laid.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  however,  the  possi- 
bility of  recalling  an  administrative  officer  at  any  time  lays 
the  emphasis  elsewhere :  it  puts  popularity  before  efficiency. 
It  may,  of  course,  be  contended  that  there  is  really  no  dif- 
ference between  the  two,  that  an  official  who  shows  skill  and 
judgment  in  the  performance  of  his  duties  is  always  respond- 
ing to  the  wishes  of  a  majority  among  the  voters.  Were 
this  a  true  statement  of  the  situation  as  it  actually  exists 
in  most  American  cities  to-day,  the  arguments  in  favor  of 
the  recall  would  be  well-nigh  unanswerable.  But  it  re- 
quires very  little  contact  with  municipal  politics  to  con- 
vince one  that  the  interests  of  the  city  as  they  may  appear 
to  a  competent  official  are  very  far  from  being  always  the 
same  thing  as  the  wishes,  whims,  or  emotions  of  the  voters. 
The  chief  weakness  of  the  recall  in  relation  to  administra- 
tive officers  is  that  it  puts  the  emphasis  at  the  wrong  point. 
It  is  an  entire  negation  of  the  principle  which  led  to  the 
rilling  of  administrative  posts  by  appointment  rather  than 
by  election. 

An  advantage  frequently  claimed  for  the  recall  is  that  it  2.  it  permits 
permits  the  lengthening  of  official  terms  without  exposing 
a  city  to  the  danger  of  establishing  an  administrative  bu- 
reaucracy.    The  practice  of  giving  short  terms  to  executive 

2A 


354  GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN   CITIES 

officers  has  been  one  of  the  weak  spots  in  American  mu- 
nicipal government.  It  points  to  one  of  the  chief  reasons  for 
the  failure  to  develop  sound  traditions  in  local  adminis- 
tration. It  has  proved  a  barrier  to  the  use  of  experts  in  the 
city's  service,  and  finds  its  only  rational  justification  in  the 
assumed  necessity  of  holding  to  direct  popular  account  all 
those  who  occupy  public  posts.  If,  therefore,  this  accounta- 
bility can  by  means  of  the  recall  be  reconciled  with  long 
terms  of  office,  the  expedient  will  have  much  to  commend 
How  far  it.  But  the  degree  of  service  which  the  recall  provision  can 
tage  can&be  render  in  this  direction  will  depend  partly  upon  the  ease 
realized.  with  which  it  can  be  invoked  to  remove  an  officer,  and 
partly  upon  the  motives  which,  as  a  rule,  actuate  the  voters 
at  recall  elections.  If  proposals  for  removal  can  be  put  un- 
der way  very  easily,  and  if  partisan  motives  determine  the 
decision  of  the  electorate,  the  outcome  will  be  the  ousting 
of  officers  with  little  regard  to  the  way  in  which  they  have 
performed  their  administrative  duties.  If,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  electorate  develops  the  conviction  that  men  should 
not  be  recalled  except  for  clear  inefficiency  or  dereliction, 
the  recall  may  provide  a  safeguard  without  impairing  official 
security  of  tenure.  One  of  the  notable  defects  of  the  short 
official  term  is  its  tendency  to  make  public  officers  spend 
too  much  of  their  time  and  thought  upon  politics.  It  has 
forced  them  to  do  everything  with  an  eye  to  their  own  re- 
appointment  or  reelection.  With  the  possibility  of  a  recall 
election  always  on  the  horizon,  would  this  situation  be  im- 
proved by  any  formal  extension  of  official  terms?  The 
answer  to  this  question  depends  wholly  upon  the  policy  which 
the  voters  develop  in  relation  to  the  recall ;  and  until  more 
facts  are  available  this  is  not  a  matter  upon  which  one  can 
safely  venture  any  prediction.1 

1  As  yet  the  recall  has  been  used  in  less  than  a  dozen  instances.     In  Los 
Angeles  it  has  been  called  into  operation  twice  since  its  establishment  in 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION  AND  THE   RECALL          355 

Popular  election  as  a  method  of  getting  capable  men  into  Arguments 
administrative  positions  has  not  found  its  efforts  crowned  recall! 
with  success  either  in  America  or  elsewhere.  Least  of  all 
has  it  proved  satisfactory  in  cities.  Yet  most  of  the  objec- 
tions that  may  be  urged  against  this  system  as  a  means 
of  securing  qualified  officers  may  be  urged  against  it  as  a 
means  of  removing  those  who  are  not  competent,  unless 
it  be  assumed  that  voters  are  governed  by  different  motives 
in  the  respective  matters  of  selection  and  removal.  When 
one  remembers,  moreover,  that  the  question  of  recalling  an 
officer  is  not  put  before  the  electorate  as  a  simple  proposition 
to  be  determined  upon  its  merits,  but  is  almost  always  linked 
up  with  the  query  as  to  whether  the  voters  would  favor  some 
other  aspirant  for  the  office,  one  sees  little  reason  to  hope 
that  electoral  tendencies  at  recall  elections  will  differ  greatly 

1903,  in  one  case  to  remove  a  member  of  the  city  council  for  having  voted 
to  award  a  contract  for  city  printing  in  a  way  that  was  displeasing  to  the 
majority  of  the  voters  in  the  ward  which  he  represented,  in  the  other  case 
to  secure  the  removal  of  the  mayor.  The  mayor,  however,  tendered  his 
resignation  before  the  recall  election  could  be  brought  about.  San  Ber- 
nardino, California,  removed  two  councilmen  in  1907.  In  Dallas,  Texas, 
the  members  of  the  school  board  were  recalled  in  1909 ;  in  Seattle,  Wash- 
ington, the  mayor  was  recalled  in  1911,  and  his  removal  was  followed  in 
the  same  year  by  an  abortive  attempt  to  recall  his  successor.  The 
mayor  and  two  commissioners  were  recalled  in  Tacoma  in  1911 ;  and 
an  attempt  to  remove  the  mayor  and  the  whole  council  of  Huron,  South 
Dakota,  failed  at  the  polls  in  the  same  year.  In  several  other  munici- 
palities as,  for  example,  in  Des  Moines,  Iowa,  the  use  of  the  recall  has 
been  threatened  as  a  means  of  securing  the  enactment  of  various  local 
measures.  For  data  on  these  matters,  see  the  chapters  on  "The  Recall  in 
Los  Angeles"  and  "The  Recall  in  Seattle,"  printed  in  the  volume  of 
selected  articles  entitled  The  Initiative,  Referendum,  and  Recall  (ed. 
W.  B.  Munro,  New  York,  1912);  H.  S.  Gilbertson's  paper  on  "Con- 
servative Aspects  of  the  Recall,"  in  National  Municipal  Review,  I.  204-211 
(April,  1912) ;  and  the  article  by  J.  D.  Barnett  on  "The  Operation  of  the 
Recall  in  Oregon,"  in  American  Political  Science  Review,  VI.  41-53  (February, 
1912).  There  is  a  chapter  on  the  recall  in  E.  P.  Oberholtzer's  Referendum, 
Initiative,  and  Recall  in  America  (New  York,  1911),  and  several  chapters 
are  devoted  to  it  in  D.  F.  Wilcox's  Government  by  All  the  People  (New 
York,  1912). 


356  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

from  those  commonly  displayed  at  ordinary  pollings.  This 
is  another  matter  in  which  everything  hinges  upon  the 
sort  of  traditions  developed.  A  somewhat  rapid  develop- 
ment is  now  in  process ;  and  upon  the  ultimate  product  will 
depend,  in  large  measure,  the  usefulness  which  the  recall 
can  display  as  an  addition  to  the  machinery  of  American 
city  government. 

REFERENCES 

A  comprehensive  bibliography,  including  not  only  books  but  pamphlets 
and  magazine  articles,  was  issued  by  the  Library  of  Congress  in  1911  under 
the  title  Select  List  of  References  on  the  Initiative,  Referendum,  and  Recatt. 
In  the  same  year  the  Legislative  Reference  Department  of  the  Ohio  State 
Library  published  a  useful  pamphlet  called  Initiative  and  Referendum  (ed. 
C.  B.  Galbreath,  Columbus,  1911),  containing  the  texts  of  constitutional 
provisions  relating  to  direct  legislation,  together  with  a  well-assorted  list 
of  printed  material  bearing  upon  different  phases  of  the  subject.  Two  of 
the  Comparative  Legislation  Bulletins  issued  by  the  Wisconsin  Free  Library 
Commission  (Nos.  12  and  21)  contain  digests  of  the  laws  and  judicial  de- 
cisions, with  brief  lists  of  references. 

Material  illustrating  the  way  in  which  provision  for  direct  legislation 
is  made  in  the  constitutions  and  statutes  may  be  found  in  C.  A.  Beard  and 
B.  E.  Shultz's  Documents  on  the  State-wide  Initiative,  Referendum,  and 
Recall  (New  York,  1911).  The  same  feature  in  its  relation  to  municipal 
government  may  be  studied  in  C.  A.  Beard's  Digest  of  Short  Ballot  Charters 
(New  York,  1911).  Many  interesting  and  useful  documents  are  also  in- 
cluded in  Senator  R.  L.  Owen's  Code  of  the  People's  Rule  (61  Cong.,  2  sess., 
Senate  Doc.  No.  603). 

Two  volumes  of  selected  readings  upon  direct  legislation  and  the  recall 
are  The  Initiative,  Referendum,  and  Recall  (ed.  W.  B.  Munro,  New  York, 
1912)  and  Articles  on  the  Initiative  and  Referendum  (ed.  E.  M.  Phelps, 
Minneapolis,  1909).  These  publications  bring  together  practically  all 
the  arguments  for  and  against  direct  democracy  that  have  been  presented 
from  any  quarter  during  the  last  few  years. 

Among  books  dealing  with  the  subject  in  a  historical  and  critical  way 
the  best  is  E.  P.  Oberholtzer's  Referendum,  Initiative,  and  Recall  in  America 
(New  York,  1911).  A  much  less  useful  work,  which  nevertheless  con- 
tains some  interesting  historical  discussions,  is  C.  S.  Lobingier's  People's 
Law  (New  York,  1909).  The  arguments  for  direct  legislation  and  the  recall 
are  vigorously  set  forth  in  D.  F.  Wilcox's  Government  by  All  the  People 
(New  York,  1912).  From  one  point  or  another  the  question  is  approached 
in  many  other  works,  such  as  W.  E.  H.  Lecky's  Democracy  and  Liberty 
(2  vols.,  London,  1896),  especially  I.  287  ff.;  Gamaliel  Bradford's  Lesson 
of  Popular  Government  (2  vols.,  New  York,  1899),  especially  II.  189-201 ; 


DIRECT   LEGISLATION   AND   THE   RECALL  357 

F.  A.  Cleveland's  Growth  of  Democracy  in  the  United  States  (New  York, 
1898),  177-241 ;  E.  L.  Godkin's  Unforeseen  Tendencies  of  Democracy  (Bos- 
ton, 1898),  96-144;  A.  L.  Lowell's  Governments  and  Parties  in  Continental 
Europe  (2  vols.,  Boston,  1896),  II.  238-300;  John  Stuart  Mill's  Repre- 
sentative Government  (New  York,  1905),  chs.  iii.-vii. ;  and  W.  F.  Dodd's 
Revision  and  Amendment  of  State  Constitutions  (Baltimore,  1910). 

Trustworthy  statistics  relating  to  the  votes  at  referenda  in  different 
states  and  cities  are  not  very  accessible.  No  inclusive  compilation  of  these 
figures  has  as  yet  been  undertaken,  and  the  material  that  has  been  put 
into  print  is  badly  scattered.  For  the  present,  at  least,  information  in 
this  field  must  be  drawn  either  from  the  public  documents  of  a  dozen 
states  and  several  times  as  many  cities,  or  in  fragmentary  form  from  such 
publications  as  the  American  Year  Book,  the  World  Almanac,  and  the 
periodical  known  as  Equity  Series,  issued  at  Philadelphia  in  the  interest 
of  the  direct-legislation  movement. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

MUNICIPAL  REFORM  AND   REFORMERS 

Thedefini-  MUNICIPAL  reform  is  the  term  commonly  used  to  desig- 
reform.  na^e  any  kind  of  organized  agitation  which  has  for  its  aim 
the  improvement  of  existing  conditions  in  some  branch  of 
local  administration.  It  is,  accordingly,  a  hydra-headed 
thing,  and  ought  not  to  be  approached  as  if  it  were  a  single 
factor  in  public  life  with  a  fixed  purpose  and  a  uniform 
method  of  attaining  its  end.  Municipal  reform  is  one  of 
the  most  comprehensive  phrases  in  the  vocabulary  of  politi- 
cal science,  comprising  as  it  does  a  legion  of  separate  agita- 
tions which  start  from  sources  widely  apart,  which  profess 
different  purposes,  and  which  employ  very  dissimilar  means 
of  carrying  their  aims  to  fruition.  Movements  for  the  simpli- 
fication of  municipal  machinery  by  a  reduction  of  the  num- 
ber of  elective  officials  in  city  government,  for  direct  nomi- 
nation methods,  for  improvements  in  the  ballot,  for  the 
introduction  of  the  initiative,  referendum,  and  recall,  for 
the  displacing  of  patronage  by  the  use  of  the  merit  system, 
for  greater  uniformity  in  accounting,  for  the  replanning  of 
streets,  for  the  extension  of  playground  facilities,  for  im- 
proved housing  conditions,  and  for  a  host  of  other  alterations 
in  the  existing  system  of  city  government  or  administration, 
are  grouped  together  under  the  generic  name  of  municipal 
reform.  It  matters  not  that  some  of  these  movements  are 
irreconcilable  with  one  another  in  purpose;  that  there 
is,  for  example,  a  necessary  antagonism  between  the  short- 
ballot  agitation,  which  seeks  to  ease  the  ballot  of  its  present 
burdens,  and  the  propaganda  for  direct  legislation,  which 

358 


MUNICIPAL   REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  359 

would,  if  successful,  make  the  ballot  more  cumbersome  than 
ever ;  or  between  the  sponsors  of  commission  government, 
who  desire  to  have  men  elected  directly  to  the  headships  of 
municipal  departments  by  popular  vote,  and  the  more  aggres- 
sive wing  of  civil-service  reformers  who  insist  that  these 
officials  should  be  selected  by  competitive  tests.  However 
poorly  they  may  harmonize  with  one  another,  all  projects 
of  civic  betterment,  from  whatever  source  they  may  come 
and  whatever  their  merits,  are  thrust  by  popular  usage 
into  the  same  broad  category.  They  are  stamped  with  the 
generic  label  of  reform,  and  those  who  urge  them  are  called 
reformers. 

From  this  point  of  view  all  citizens  ought  properly  to  be  Reform  and 
included  within  the  ranks  of  municipal  reformers,  for  it  would  progresa- 
be  difficult  to  find  any  one  ready  to  declare  his  unqualified 
satisfaction  with  civic  conditions  as  they  are.  Men  differ 
widely,  of  course,  in  regard  to  the  exact  location  of  munic- 
ipal ills  and  as  to  the  cause  of  them ;  and  even  more  widely, 
perhaps,  they  disagree  as  to  the  remedies  that  ought  to  be 
applied.  But  the  man  who  would  assert  that  the  United 
States  has  reached  finality  in  municipal  organization,  that 
there  is  now  no  room  for  betterment  in  any  branch  of  it, 
would  be  either  insincere  in  his  expression  of  opinion  or  blind 
to  the  facts  about  him.  In  the  last  analysis,  therefore, 
every  citizen  who  is  not  absolutely  devoid  of  political  vision 
must,  in  greater  or  less  degree,  be  a  partisan  of  reform ;  or, 
to  put  it  in  a  more  palatable  form,  he  must  be  a  friend  of 
progress  wherever  opportunities  for  progress  appear.  It  is 
quite  in  consonance  with  the  tendency  to  anomaly  in  Ameri- 
can political  life,  however,  that  those  who  proclaim  from  the 
housetops  their  progressive  temperament,  and  declare  that 
as  the  old  order  changeth  it  must  give  place  to  the  new,  are 
the  very  ones  who  most  resent  the  title  of  reformers. 

For  all  this  there  is  a  good  reason.     Reform  and  reformers 


360 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 


Reform  and 
reformers 
as  the  pub- 
lic views 
them. 


The  general 
types  of 
reform 
organiza- 
tions. 


I.   National 
and  state 
organiza- 
tions. 


1.  With 
general 
programmes 
of  reform. 


are  words  that  have  gathered  a  dubious  significance  in  the 
public  imagination.  A  municipal-reform  movement  has 
come  to  be  regarded  as  something  which  men  of  good  in- 
tention launch  from  time  to  time  into  the  arena  of  local 
politics  with  little  study  of  its  practical  merits,  and  attempt 
to  drive  through  without  much  attention  to  established 
methods  of  procedure.  The  reformer,  in  consequence,  is 
commonly  thought  of  as  an  empirical  individual  who  gives 
his  allegiance  to  visionary  schemes,  who  promises  much  and 
performs  little,  and  whose  ways  are  those  of  a  busybody. 
Notions  of  this  sort  do  not  attach  to  men  or  to  movements 
without  some  cause,  and  for  their  existence  the  typical  munic- 
ipal reformer  of  the  last  few  decades  has  been  hi  large  degree 
responsible.  General  impressions  concerning  any  public 
activity  are  apt  to  be  derived  from  the  outstanding 
personalities  connected  with  it ;  and  the  men  who  have  been 
most  often  in  the  vanguard  of  reform  movements  have  not 
always  been  of  a  sort  to  gain  much  hold  upon  the  public 
confidence.  The  reason  why  this  has  been  so  will  be 
noticed  a  little  later  on.1 

Municipal  reform  organizations  have  been  of  various  sorts. 
Some  of  them  have  been  general  hi  scope;  that  is  to  say, 
they  have  aimed  to  include  many  cities  within  their  sphere 
of  influence.  A  few  have  been  national  in  their  range  of 
activities,  trying  to  secure  improvement  in  municipal  condi- 
tions all  along  the  line.  Organized  agitation  of  this  sort, 
broad  in  its  field  of  effort,  may  or  may  not  be  very  definite 
in  the  things  which  it  seeks  to  accomplish.  A  few  national 
reform  organizations  have  set  no  exact  bounds  to  their  work, 
and  do  not,  therefore,  concentrate  their  efforts  upon  any 
specific  betterment  in  municipal  administration.  Of  this 
type  the  National  Municipal  League  and  the  American  Civic 
Association  afford  good  examples.  The  membership  of 

1  See  below,  pp.  382-383. 


MUNICIPAL  REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  361 

these  associations  is  recruited  from  cities  in  all  parts  of  the 
country ;  each  maintains  national  headquarters  from  which 
a  campaign  of  education  is  carried  on  in  various  directions ; 
and  each  professes  adherence  to  a  general  programme  of 
civic  improvement.  Neither  of  them  gives  its  entire  alle- 
giance to  any  single  project  of  reform,  but  each  endeavors  to 
lend  a  hand  to  every  local  movement  which  looks  promising. 
Such  organizations  render  their  chief  service  as  channels  of 
information;  they  provide  at  their  annual  conventions 
forums  for  the  discussion  of  all  matters  which  affect  American 
cities  as  a  whole;  and  to  the  information  thereby  brought 
together  they  give  a  wide  currency  through  their  printed 
proceedings  or  other  publications.1  They  have  been  called 
clearing-houses  for  the  exchange  of  municipal  ideas,  and  they 
have,  to  some  extent  at  any  rate,  fulfilled  the  functions  im- 
plied in  this  designation. 

Narrower  in  the  range  of  their  membership,  but  similar 
in  general  purposes  and  methods,  are  various  state  organ- 
izations, such  as  the  Municipal  Government  Association  of 
New  York  State,  the  Ohio  Municipal  Association,  or  the 
Massachusetts  Civic  League,  which  are  sometimes  affiliated 
with  the  national  bodies  and  thereby  secure  a  certain  co- 
ordination of  work.  The  membership  of  all  these  bodies, 
whether  national  or  state,  is  made  up  mainly  of  laymen ;  it 
includes  relatively  few  men  who  are  or  have  been  in  mu- 
nicipal office.  Small  annual  dues  are  collected  from  mem- 
bers, the  revenue  gathered  in  this  way  going  to  pay  the 
salary  of  a  permanent  secretary  and  to  defray  the  cost 
of  the  reform  literature  distributed.  The  office  of  the 
secretary  is  the  focal  point  in  the  association's  enterprises, 

1  The  literature  of  the  National  Municipal  League,  for  example,  in- 
cludes an  annual  volume  of  Proceedings,  occasional  volumes  on  special 
topics  issued  in  the  National  Municipal  Series,  a  quarterly  publication 
known  as  the  National  Municipal  Review,  besides  leaflets  and  clipping 
sheets  put  forth  at  frequent  intervals. 


362  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

and  in  some  of  the  state  organizations  the  duties  of  this 
official  extend  to  such  matters  as  the  drafting  of  bills  in  the 
interest  of  municipal  reform  and  the  promoting  of  these 
measures  before  the  legislature. 

Another  type  of  national  reform  organization,  though  as 
broad  geographically,  professes  more  definite  aims.  Such  are 
the  National  Civil  Service  Reform  League,  the  Short  Ballot 
Organization,  and  the  City  Planning  Conference,  which  bend 
their  entire  energies  to  the  extension  of  the  merit  system  of 
appointment  to  public  office,  the  reform  of  the  old-style 
ballot,  and  the  betterment  of  urban  physical  conditions 
respectively.  These  bodies  also  maintain  national  head- 
quarters, but  they  accomplish  a  good  deal  of  their  work  of 
active  propaganda  through  state  and  municipal  organiza- 
tions developed  under  their  auspices.  Being  more  specific  in 
their  programmes  of  effort,  they  are  able  to  obtain  results  which 
are  more  direct  and  more  tangible,  if  perhaps  no  more  im- 
portant in  the  long  run,  than  the  achievements  of  associa- 
tions that  spread  their  interest  over  wider  fields.  They  are 
aggressive  and  persevering  in  their  campaigns  of  education, 
and  have  not  been  daunted  by  obstacles  that  at  times 
appeared  insuperable.  On  the  whole,  their  actual  success,  as 
indicated  by  the  laws  that  have  gone  upon  the  statute-books 
through  their  efforts,  constitutes  much  more  than  a  profitable 
return  for  the  time,  patience,  and  money  expended.  This  is  in 
part  due  to  the  fact  that  such  organizations,  unlike  those 
which  give  their  backing  to  extensive  and  inchoate  pro- 
grammes, are  able  to  mass  all  their  resources  upon  what  for 
the  moment  seems  to  be  a  vulnerable  point.  Wherever,  for 
example,  a  new  city  charter  is  being  framed,  the  efforts  of 
the  Civil  Service  Reform  League  or  of  the  Short  Ballot 
Organization  are  deflected  to  that  point  and  remain  centred 
thereuntil  the  issues  raised  are  determined  for  or  against  them. 
As  each  experience  in  this  direction  improves  the  generalship 


MUNICIPAL  REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  363 

of  the  next  attempt,  a  marked  proficiency  in  the  arts  of  the 
political  evangelist  is  in  course  of  time  acquired. 

There  is  still  another  class  of  organizations  which,  though  3.  Official 
it  does  not  commonly  adopt  the  terminology  of  reform,  ^ona?™ 
is  none  the  less  an  active  agency  of  municipal  betterment.  ?^niza~ 
Within  this  class  are  included  the  various  associations  of 
municipal  corporations  or  city  officials,  such  as  the  League 
of  American  Municipalities,  the  various  state  leagues  of 
municipalities,  associations  of  city  engineers  or  health 
officials  or  police  chiefs,  and  so  on.1  Such  organizations  are 
professional  in  character;  their  chief  object  is  not  the  pro- 
motion of  any  single  reform  or  set  of  reforms,  but  only  the 
interchange  of  ideas  for  the  mutual  benefit  of  members.  At 
their  meetings,  which  are  held  annually  or  oftener,  papers 
upon  matters  of  professional  interest  are  read  and  general 
discussions,  frequently  on  questions  of  technical  administra- 
tion, take  place.  The  service  rendered  by  bodies  of  this  sort 
in  broadening  the  horizon  of  city  officials  is  of  great  value,  but 
there  is  still  room  for  much  progress  along  this  line.  Similar 
associations  of  city  officials  have  attained  to  great  usefulness 
and  influence  abroad,  particularly  in  England,  where  they 
have  had  a  considerable  share  in  developing  traditions  of  offi- 
cial permanence  in  the  administrative  service  of  the  boroughs. 

All  three  classes  of  organizations  named  in  the  foregoing  n.  Local 
pages,  —  namely,  those  which  work  for  the  improvement 
of  municipal  conditions  in  general,  those  which  give  their 
attention  to  improvement  in  one  specific  direction,  and 
those  which  afford  opportunities  for  the  officials  of  one 
municipality  to  learn  what  other  cities  are  doing,  —  all  these 

1  Some  typical  organizations  of  this  type  are  the  American  Public 
Health  Association,  the  American  Association  of  Park  Superintendents, 
the  American  Waterworks  Association,  the  International  Association  of 
Chiefs  of  Police,  the  Indiana  Sanitary  and  Water  Supply  Association, 
the  Pacific  Coast  Association  of  Fire  Chiefs,  the  Massachusetts  Police 
Association,  and  scores  of  others. 


364  GOVERNMENT   OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

are  inter-civic  bodies  whose  activities  are  broader  than  the 
bounds  of  any  single  municipality.  They  are  national 
or  state  or  sectional  associations.  Another  type  of  reform 
organization,  however,  of  which  there  are  more  numerous 
examples,  is  the  local  reform  society  which  carries  on  its 
work  within  the  limits  of  a  single  city.  If  one  includes  within 
the  category  of  municipal  reform  organizations  all  those 
bodies  which  are  engaged  in  some  field  of  political  or  social 
amelioration,  the  number  would  prove  astonishingly  large  in 
any  of  our  great  cities.  In  the  metropolitan  district  of 
Boston  a  census  of  such  organizations,  taken  two  years  ago, 
showed  that  there  were  1658  of  them  in  all.  This  number  in- 
cluded societies  engaged  in  every  field  of  reform,  whether 
political,  social,  educational,  or  aesthetic,  and  ranging  in 
size  and  importance  from  the  Chamber  of  Commerce  with 
5000  members  to  neighborhood  improvement  leagues  with 
membership  lists  which  sometimes  did  not  include  more 
than  a  dozen  names.1  In  their  professed  purposes  these 
associations  cover  the  whole  arena  of  civic  effort ;  yet  in 
fundamental  motive  they  are  so  nearly  akin  that  most 
of  their  aims  could  readily  be  formulated  into  a  single  reform 
programme.  An  enumeration  made  on  a  less  compre- 
hensive scale  in  St  Louis  last  year  resulted  in  the  publi- 
cation of  a  directory  of  organizations  which  covers  over 
forty  pages,  without  including  societies  that  are  purely 
political,  social,  or  charitable  in  their  activities.2  It  is 
hard  to  say  just  where  the  line  should  be  drawn  between 
bodies  which  ought  to  be  reckoned  as  agents  of  municipal 
betterment  and  those  which  ought  not ;  but  even  under  the 
strictest  interpretation  the  category  of  the  former  is  un- 
questionably large  in  all  great  American  cities. 

1  Handbook  of  Boston-1916,  21. 

2  Directory  of  Civic  and  Business  Associations  of  Saint  Louis,  issued  by 
the  Civic  League  of  St.  Louis,  May,  1911. 


MUNICIPAL   REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  365 

Taking  these 'local  reform  organizations  as  a  whole,  they  i.  Local 
may  be  grouped  according  to  their  purposes  and  methods  into 
five  classes.  In  the  first  place,  there  is  the  reform  association 
which  assumes  the  role  of  a  political  party.  An  example  of 
this  type  was  afforded  for  many  years  by  the  Citizens'  Union 
of  New  York.  This  body,  organized  in  1897  with  a  large 
and  influential  membership,  developed  all  the  machinery  of 
a  regular  political  party,  put  its  own  candidates  in  the  field, 
conducted  a  campaign  for  their  election,  and  provided  its 
own  campaign  funds.  It  drew  its  adherents  from  both 
the  regular  political  parties,  and  at  the  outset  was  opposed 
by  both  party  organizations.  At  the  New  York  municipal  TheCiti- 
election  of  1897  it  undertook  to  elect  its  own  slate  of  candi- 
dates  without  the  aid  of  either  one ;  and,  although  it  failed  to 
secure  this  result,  it  did  succeed  in  drawing  over  150,000  votes 
to  its  nominee  for  the  mayoralty.  The  experience  demon- 
strated what  has  since  been  shown  in  some  other  cities,  — that 
the  task  of  electing  municipal  officers  in  the  face  of  opposi- 
tion from  both  the  regular  political  parties  is  one  of  great 
difficulty,  unless  there  are  outstanding  issues  upon  which  the 
ranks  of  the  regular  parties  can  be  badly  broken.  For  an  in- 
dependent organization  to  provide  the  machinery  and  the 
funds  necessary  for  such  a  campaign  is  in  itself  a  big  under- 
taking ;  but  to  gain  a  majority  of  the  votes  at  the  polls  is 
more  difficult  still  unless  the  circumstances  are  very  excep- 
tional. 

More  favored  with  tangible  results  are  those  reform  or-  2.  Fusion 
ganizations  which,  instead  of  selecting  and  attempting  to 
secure  the  election  of  their  own  candidates  independently, 
work  hand  in  hand  with  one  of  the  regular  political  parties, 
usually  with  the  minority.  This  was  the  policy  pursued 
by  the  Citizens'  Union  in  the  New  York  campaign  of  1901, 
when,  by  joining  hands  with  the  Republican  party  in  a 
fusion  arrangement,  it  achieved  the  election  of  a  joint 


366  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

slate.  A  similar  plan  has  been  followed,  although  not  so 
openly,  by  the  Citizens'  Municipal  League  of  Boston  and  by 
like  organizations  in  other  cities.  From  the  nature  of  things, 
success  is  more  easily  obtained  by  fusion  or  cooperation  than 
by  independent  effort.  Cooperation  with  one  of  the  regular 
parties  secures  the  services  of  an  organization  already  in 
existence,  and  guarantees  the  candidates  a  large  number  of 
votes  from  straight  party  adherents.  All  that  the  reform 
element  has  to  do  is  to  split  off  from  the  dominant  party 
enough  votes  to  turn  the  scale,  obviously  a  much  easier  task 
than  building  up  an  organization  from  the  ground  and 
mustering  support  enough  to  outvote  both  the  established 
parties.  It  requires  less  money  for  campaign  expenses  and 
less  individual  effort. 

But  when  fusion,  whether  avowed  or  not,  manages  to 
succeed,  its  success  is  rarely  productive  of  great  improve- 
ment in  either  the  personnel  or  the  work  of  municipal 
administration.  When  a  reform  organization  acts  in  unison 
with  one  of  the  regular  parties,  it  must  perforce  yield  much  of 
its  freedom  in  the  selection  of  candidates ;  it  must  give  its 
support  to  those  who  are  acceptable  to  its  ally.  A  fusion 
ticket  is,  accordingly,  one  of  mottled  quality,  bearing  the 
names  of  some  whose  personal  claims  do  not  entitle  them 
to  a  place  upon  it,  but  who  are  taken  on  as  the  price  of  par- 
tisan support  for  the  entire  slate.  Moreover,  since  the  regular 
party  organization  which  takes  a  large  part  in  the  electoral 
battle  demands  its  share  in  the  spoils  of  victory,  a  fusion 
administration,  when  installed  in  power,  is  not  likely  to 
be  much  less  partisan  than  one  which  goes  into  office  with  a 
plain  party  designation.  That,  at  any  rate,  seems  thus  far  to 
have  been  the  usual  character  of  such  administrations. 
Even  the  so-termed  "  non-partisan  "  movements  that  have 
been  launched  in  many  American  cities  represent  in  most  cases 
the  rather  thinly  veiled  attempt  of  a  minority  party  to  gain  a 


MUNICIPAL  REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  367 

grip  upon  affairs  at  the  city  hall  by  professing  to  be  what  it  is 
not.  Such  movements  occasionally  succeed  for  a  time ;  but 
the  cloven  hoof  soon  discloses  itself,  and  the  voters  decline  to 
be  further  misled  by  the  hollow  professions  of  merely  titular 
non-partisanship.  The  reform  organization  which  allies 
itself  with  any  regular  party  machine  sells  its  own  birthright 
for  the  pottage  of  transitory  success ;  for  the  principles  of  all 
municipal  reform  worthy  of  the  name  run  counter  to  those 
upon  which  regular  party  organizations  are  usually  built. 
When  reform,  therefore,  yokes  itself  with  a  political  machine 
(which  in  municipal  politics  means  almost  always  the  state 
organization),  it  sacrifices  its  claim  to  the  allegiance  of  all 
those  who  believe  that  municipal  campaigns  should  turn 
upon  local  issues.  Government  by  a  political  machine 
disguised  in  the  garb  of  reform,  non-partisanship,  fusion, 
or  independence  has  been  imposed  upon  us  too  frequently ; 
but  its  day  has  now  about  come  to  an  end.  There  are 
situations,  to  be  sure,  in  which  the  cause  of  municipal  better- 
ment can  be  furthered  by  the  aid  of  an  established  political 
organization;  but  as  a  matter  of  experience  they  do  not 
occur  very  often.  In  the  long  run  it  is  better  for  the  cause 
of  reform  to  avoid  entangling  alliances.  To  say  that  it  can- 
not make  headway  without  combining  its  forces  with  bodies 
whose  ideals  are  at  variance  with  its  own  is  to  confess  that 
reform,  as  reform,  cannot  succeed  at  all. 

There  is,  however,  one  line  of  action  whereby  those  who  are  3.  Non- 
earnest  in  their  desire  for  an  improvement  in  the  caliber  of  organiza 
municipal  office-holders   can  exert  a  very  substantial  in-  * 
fluence  at  the  elections ;  and  this  is  the  policy  adopted  by  the 
third   type  of    municipal   reform    organization.     The  best 
example  of  this  class,  and  the  one  most  commonly  used  as  an 
illustration,  is  the  Municipal  Voters'  League  of  Chicago.1 

1  A  full  account  of  the  history,  aims,  and  achievements  of  this  organiza- 
tion may  be  found  in  a  pamphlet  issued  by  it  in  1910. 


368  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

This  association  was  established  in  1896  by  a  committee 
of  one  hundred  citizens  made  up  of  one  Republican  and  one 
Democrat  from  each  of  the  thirty-four  wards  then  in  the 
TheMunici-  city,  and  thirty-two  members  chosen  from  the  city  at  large 
League^  without  reference  to  political  affiliations.  The  League  came 
Chicago.  ^0  existence  at  a  time  when  the  Chicago  city  council  had 
become  so  hopelessly  inefficient  in  its  management  of  the 
city's  business  that  well-founded  rumors  of  corruption  were 
everywhere  in  the  air.  Several  thousand  voters  were 
enrolled  as  members  of  the  new  organization,  and  its  work  was 
at  once  begun.  For  sixteen  years  the  Municipal  Voters' 
League  has  steadily  held  itself  aloof  from  the  regular  political 
parties ;  it  has  never  put  forward  candidates  either  in  its 
own  behalf  or  in  avowed  alliance  with  any  other  political 
body.  Its  sole  work  has  been  to  investigate  the  records  of 
candidates  nominated  by  the  regular  party  organizations, 
and  to  publish  the  results  of  these  investigations.  Pro- 
ceeding upon  the  principle  that  those  who  come  forward  as 
candidates  for  elective  office  ought  to  be  willing  to  have  the 
widest  publicity  given  to  their  records,  it  obtains  all  the  in- 
formation concerning  their  capabilities  and  experience  that 
is  likely  to  prove  useful  in  guiding  voters,  and  this  informa- 
tion, together  with  its  own  conclusions  based  thereon,  it 
presents  in  printed  form  to  every  voter  in  the  city.  It 
advises  the  election  of  some  and  the  defeat  of  others ;  but 
obviously  it  does  not  assume  to  guarantee  the  future  capacity 
or  integrity  of  those  whom  it  recommends  to  the  voters,  for 
it  has  nothing  to  do  with  selecting  the  candidates.  In  a 
few  cases,  when  such  action  has  seemed  necessary  to  secure 
at  least  one  fit  candidate  in  some  ward,  the  Municipal  Voters' 
League  has  cooperated  with  citizens  of  the  neighborhood  in 
persuading -some  suitable  aspirant  to  take  the  field, 
itamachin-  The  machinery  of  the  organization  is  simple.  Its  entire 
membership,  which  numbers  over  3000  voters,  is  never  called 


MUNICIPAL  REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  369 

together ;  the  work  is  directed  by  an  executive  committee  of 
nine  members  elected  for  a  three-year  term,  three  of  whom 
retire  annually.  This  committee  has  the  sole  authority  to 
commit  the  organization  for  or  against  any  candidate  or 
measure.  Each  year  the  League,  through  its  executive 
committee,  adopts  a  brief  platform  relating  to  current  mu- 
nicipal issues.  This  is  presented  to  every  candidate  for  his 
signature,  and  information  as  to  whether  he  gives  or  refuses 
adherence  to  it  is  printed  in  the  pamphlet  sent  to  the  voters. 
An  examination  of  the  platforms  adopted  during  the  last  few 
years  reveals  the  fact  that,  while  most  of  the  principles 
enunciated  in  them  are  of  a  general  and  rather  non-conten- 
tious nature,  some  of  them  apply  specifically  to  definite 
issues  pending  before  the  public.1  Candidates  who  give 
adherence  to  the  platform  do  so  by  pledging  that  they  will 
work  and  vote  both  in  committee  and  on  the  floor  of  the  coun- 
cil to  carry  out  all  the  principles  which  it  sets  forth. 

The  work  of  the  Municipal  Voters'  League  has  been  so  its  success, 
successful  as  to  attract  attention  throughout  the  country. 

1  Here  are  a  few  items  from  the  platform  of  1911 :  — 

' '  Sec.  6.  The  health  and  welfare  of  the  people  depend  in  a  large  measure 
upon  hygienic  and  sanitary  conditions,  and  every  alderman  should  strive 
to  have  these  constantly  improved  and  maintained  in  the  best  possible 
state.  The  public  health  should  in  no  instance  be  sacrificed  to  special 
interests. 

"Sec.  7.  The  city  in  all  its  departments  should  have  a  thor- 
ough and  businesslike  system  of  accounting  and  auditing.  Through 
periodic  examinations,  the  employment  of  experts,  and  the  technical  study 
of  functions,  administration,  and  requirements  of  the  various  branches  of 
municipal  government,  improved  business  methods  should  be  introduced 
into  all  of  them;  so  that  not  only  may  economies  be  effected,  but  the 
most  approved  and  skilled  service  rendered  to  the  people. 

"Sec.  8.  An  alderman  should  uphold  the  strict  enforcement  of  the 
civil  service  law  and  the  application  of  the  merit  system  to  municipal 
employment. 

"Sec.  10.  No  grant  should  be  made  for  any  public  utility  without 
expressly  reserving  to  the  city  the  opportunity  for  municipal  purchase,  at 
or  before  the  expiration  of  such  grant,  upon  fair  terms  and  reasonable 
notice.  ..." 

2B 


370  GOVERNMENT    OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

In  1896,  when  it  began  its  operations,  it  branded  as  corrupt  or 
unfit  fifty-eight  out  of  sixty-eight  aldermen,  some  of  whom 
were  eliminated  at  the  very  next  municipal  election ;  and 
by  1901  it  had  secured  for  Chicago  a  city  council  of  which  a 
majority  of  the  members  bore  the  stamp  of  its  approval. 
During  the  last  ten  years  this  control  has  been  maintained ; 
at  no  time  have  the  regular  party  organizations  been  able, 
save  in  a  few  wards,  to  elect  men  whom  the  League  has 
designated  as  unfit.  Since  1900  about  eighty-five  per  cent 
of  the  candidates  receiving  its  indorsement  have  been 
elected,  and  after  fifteen  years  of  active  existence  it  remains 
an  exceedingly  influential  force  in  the  politics  of  the  city. 
In  view  of  the  fact  that  the  Chicago  city  council  is  a  more 
important  arm  of  local  government  than  are  corresponding 
bodies  in  most  other  large  American  cities,  and  that  it  has 
had,  during  the  last  half-dozen  years,  several  difficult  munici- 
pal questions  (such  as  traction  franchises)  to  deal  with,  the 
service  rendered  by  the  League  has  been  of  incalculable 
value.  It  is,  indeed,  due  largely  to  its  efforts  that  the  mu- 
nicipal council  of  Chicago  is,  for  its  size,  one  of  the  best  in 
the  United  States  both  in  the  average  caliber  of  the  men 
chosen  to  it  and  in  its  methods  of  work. 

Similar  Several    other    large    cities    have    reform    organizations 

tkM^iiT"  somewhat  similar  in  structure  and  in  general  activities,  but 
other  cities.  none  have  been  so  uniformly  effective.  The  Good  Govern- 
ment Association  of  Boston  has  come  to  be  a  very  influential 
factor  in  the  politics  of  that  city  since  the  municipal  council 
was  reorganized  in  1909.  Of  the  nine  councilmen  now  in 
office  all  but  one  were  elected  with  its  indorsement,  in  most 
cases  after  a  clear-cut  contest  against  candidates  put  forward 
by  a  regular  party  organization.  The  Municipal  Association 
of  Cleveland,  the  Civic  League  of  St.  Louis,  and  similar 
bodies  in  various  other  cities  also  do  good  service.  In  addition 
to  their  work  of  investigating  and  reporting  upon  candidates, 


MUNICIPAL   REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  371 

these  organizations  in  some  cases  keep  close  watch  throughout 
the  year  upon  everything  that  goes  on  at  the  city  hall,  and 
publish  the  results  of  their  observations  for  the  information 
of  voters. 

Organizations  that  confine  their  efforts  to  the  fields  The  task  of 
above  outlined  are  able  to  do  very  effective  work  without  Ha 
any  great  expenditure  of  money.  The  services  of  a  perma- 
nent secretary  are  required,  there  is  some  expense  for  liter- 
ature, and  at  election  time  an  outlay  is  necessary  in  order 
to  secure  accurate  information  concerning  the  records  of 
candidates.  But  there  are  no  campaign  expenses  in  the 
ordinary  sense ;  for  such  associations  do  not  regularly 
undertake  to  secure,  through  the  ordinary  channels,  the  elec- 
tion of  those  candidates  to  whom  they  give  their  indorsement. 
The  ever-present  danger  is,  however,  that  such  an  organiza- 
tion in  a  city  may  be  captured  by  active  partisans.  The  re- 
form association  that  gives  its  stamp  to  ill-qualified  candi- 
dates because  of  their  party  affiliations,  or  for  the  same  reason 
denies  indorsement  to  others,  very  quickly  loses  its  hold 
upon  public  confidence ;  and,  since  all  men  are  partisan  to 
a  greater  extent  than  they  commonly  realize,  it  is  no  easy 
matter  to  maintain  a  course  of  strict  impartiality.  When 
the  indorsement  of  a  reform  organization  once  becomes 
a  recognized  political  asset,  machine  leaders  spare  no 
pains  to  capture  this  label  for  their  own  candidates ;  and  the 
ways  in  which  they  seek  to  do  this  are  sometimes  very  in- 
genious. Not  a  few  such  organizations  have  failed  to  with- 
stand the  pressure  brought  to  bear  on  them  in  the  interest 
of  regular  party  candidates  by  men  who  are  reputedly  above 
such  tactics,  but  who  have  attained  to  influence  in  the  coun- 
sels of  the  reform  cause  by  liberal  contributions  to  its  funds. 

A  fourth  class  of  reform  organizations  includes  that  legion  4.  Non- 
of  associations,  clubs,  leagues,  federations,  and  so  on  which  organiza 
are  chiefly  civic  in  aim,  but  which  do  not  participate  actively  tlon3* 


372  GOVERNMENT    OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

in  municipal  politics  by  nominating  or  indorsing  or  cam- 
paigning for  candidates.  These  are  commonly  called 
citizens'  leagues,  taxpayers'  associations,  improvement 
societies,  or  reform  clubs.  Their  activities  are  varied. 
Most  of  them  hold  meetings  from  time  to  time  and  hear 
addresses  upon  matters  of  current  municipal  interest ;  some 
issue  pamphlets  occasionally,  and  a  few  have  regular  bulletins. 
Nearly  all  of  them  come  forward  at  times  with  proposals 
for  the  consideration  of  either  the  local  or  the  state  authori- 
ties, and  delegations  from  them  are  constantly  pressing  some 
project  of  municipal  betterment  before  legislative  committees 
or  some  municipal  authority.  Each  association  of  this 
type  is  apt  to  have  its  own  specialty.  One  is  most  con- 
cerned with  civil-service  reform,  another  with  playgrounds 
and  places  of  recreation,  a  third  with  the  abatement  of 
bill-board  nuisances,  a  fourth  with  the  problem  of  laying 
adequate  restrictions  upon  public-service  companies,  a  fifth 
with  the  reform  of  municipal  accounting,  and  so  on.  The 
methods  pursued  are  adapted  to  the  ends  in  view,  and  they 
differ  just  as  widely.  All  such  organizations,  of  course,  need 
money  for  their  work,  and  they  usually  obtain  it  either  from 
The  work  of  membership  dues  or  from  general  subscriptions.  The  total 
these  bodies  amoun^  gathered  in  this  way  by  the  host  of  betterment  or- 
ganizations that  exist  in  every  great  city  must  be  enormous  each 
year ;  yet  the  tangible  results  that  come  from  its  expenditure 
are  astonishingly  meagre.  One  reason  for  this  situation  is 
that  much  of  the  money  is  spent  in  ways  that  are  wholly  or 
partly  ineffective.  Salaries  and  clerical  expenses  devour 
most  of  the  income  which  the  average  reform  organization 
is  able  to  secure.  A  secretary  is  usually  employed,  and  the 
salary  of  this  official,  together  with  clerk  hire  and  office  rent, 
may  easily  absorb  two-thirds  or  more  of  the  year's  revenue. 
Many  reform  organizations  regularly  present  the  curious 
spectacle  of  a  secretary  who  spends  most  of  his  time  gathering 


MUNICIPAL   REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  373 

funds  for  the  association  and  then  uses  most  of  these  funds  to 
pay  for  the  time  he  has  spent  in  gathering  them.  Some  of 
these  bodies  seem  to  take  it  for  granted  that  their  mere  exist- 
ence constitutes  a  public  service ;  at  any  rate,  the  compla*- 
cent  lethargy  which  their  paid  officials  frequently  display 
would  not  be  tolerated  in  any  regular  municipal  employees, 
slothful  as  many  of  the  latter  may  be.  All  our  larger  cities 
fairly  abound  in  organizations  which  bear  impressive  names 
and  whose  officials  from  time  to  time  put  themselves  for- 
ward as  the  spokesmen  of  important  elements  in  the  commu- 
nity, when,  as  a  matter  of  plain  truth,  some  of  them  do  not 
possess  a  corporal's  guard  of  members  and  perform  no  public 
service  worthy  of  the  name. 

Municipal  waste  through  the  masterly  inactivity  of  public  Their  lack 
officials  and  through  the  failure  of  different  departments  to  ^on.  J 
work  in  harmony  has  become  proverbial.  Yet  it  may  be 
debated  whether  public  authority  has  displayed  these  short- 
comings in  a  degree  relatively  greater  than  that  shown  by 
civic-welfare  organizations  as  a  whole.  The  overlapping 
of  effort  among  these  latter  is  so  notorious  as  to  warrant  the 
suggestion  that  the  professed  friends  of  municipal  reform 
should  begin  by  setting  their  own  house  in  order.  Every 
large  city  has  within  its  bounds  hundreds  of  betterment 
organizations  at  work  in  the  same  general  field  of  effort 
without  the  slightest  reference  to  one  another.  Actual 
cooperation  among  them  is  almost  unknown ;  at  best  it  exists 
only  as  a  principle  to  which  they  have,  at  some  time  or  other, 
given  a  perfunctory  adherence.1  In  Boston  at  the  present 

1The  movement  known  as  "Boston-1915"  had  as  its  principal  aim 
"to  bring  about  the  active  cooperation  of  all  organizations  which  are 
trying  to  do  something  for  the  improvement  of  living  conditions  in  Greater 
Boston";  but  its  leaders  soon  found  their  task  too  great.  In  St.  Louis 
at  the  present  time  a  similar  attempt  is  being  made,  on  a  much  less  compre- 
hensive scale,  to  secure  cooperation  among  about  thirty  of  the  more  im- 
portant civic  associations. 


374 


GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 


5.  Miscel- 
laneous 
organiza- 
tions. 


moment  there  are  no  fewer  than  six  distinct  organizations 
investigating  the  housing  conditions  of  the  city  with  a 
view  to  framing  remedial  measures.  No  one  of  these 
investigations  is  at  all  likely  to  prove  comprehensive, 
thorough,  or  reliable,  for  the  reason  that  the  resources  of 
none  of  the  individual  societies  suffice  to  make  it  so.  Each 
will  cover  the  field  in  part,  and  each  will  doubtless  reach  its 
own  conclusions.  Yet  the  energy  and  funds  which  are  being 
devoted  to  this  task  would,  if  concentrated  under  a  single 
directing  authority,  be  ample  to  have  the  whole  research 
made  in  businesslike  fashion.  Thus  it  is  that  the  organiza- 
tions which  so  readily  berate  city  departments  for  unbusi- 
nesslike methods  are  themselves  often  open  to  the  very 
same  criticism  in  greater  degree.  A  clearing-house  of  reform 
activities,  —  that  is  to  say,  a  recognized  centre  at  which 
each  association  can  find  out  what  others  are  doing  and 
through  which  wasteful  duplication  of  effort  can  be  avoided, 
—  is  one  of  the  chief  municipal  needs  of  the  present  day. 

Finally,  there  are  organizations  which,  though  avowedly 
commercial,  industrial,  professional,  or  social  in  purpose, 
regularly  lend  their  support  to  movements  for  municipal 
reform.  The  chambers  of  commerce,  boards  of  trade, 
and  merchants'  associations,  the  labor  unions,  the  medical 
societies  and  associations  of  architects,  the  city  clubs  which 
have  been  established  in  the  large  municipalities,  all  afford 
examples  of  this  type.  Many  of  these  bodies,  especially  the 
commercial  organizations,  maintain  regular  committees  on 
municipal  matters,  which  follow  closely  all  that  is  going  on  at 
the  city  hall  or  the  state  capitol.1  Their  point  of  view  is  of 
course  primarily  businesslike  or  professional,  but  incidentally 
they  are  useful  agencies  for  calling  public  attention  to  pending 

1  For  examples,  see  the  annual  reports  of  the  Boston  Chamber  of 
Commerce,  the  Cleveland  Chamber  of  Commerce,  and  the  New  Orleans 
Board  of  Trade. 


MUNICIPAL  REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  375 

proposals  and  promoting  discussion  among  the  various  in- 
terests affected.  By  passing  resolutions  and  transmitting 
them  to  the  mayor  or  the  city  council,  they  manage  to  secure 
a  representation  of  their  views.  The  labor  unions  in  par- 
ticular have  adopted  the  policy  of  putting  upon  record  their 
opinions  concerning  municipal  matters,  and  their  resolu-  , 
tions  embodying  such  expressions  of  opinion  carry  con- 
siderable weight  with  elective  officials.  Some  of  these 
miscellaneous  bodies,  particularly  the  chambers  of  com- 
merce and  the  professional  organizations,  have  conducted 
thorough  investigations  into  various  branches  of  local  ad- 
ministration and  have  put  the  results  into  publications 
which  are  of  permanent  value.  Although  the  attention 
which  all  such  associations  give  to  strictly  municipal  matters 
is  rather  incidental,  it  is  nevertheless  of  great  service, 
for  business  and  professional  bodies  are  influential  in  mould- 
ing public  opinion.  When  several  of  these  organizations 
range  themselves  behind  any  public  project,  they  give  it 
momentum ;  but  the  trouble  is  that  they  are  seldom  found 
ranged  together. 

An  interesting  development  of  the  last  two  decades  has  been  The  city 
the  rise  of  the  city  club.  New  York  led  the  way  in  1892  club8' 
by  establishing  an  organization  which  endeavors  to  combine 
the  usual  facilities  of  a  social  club  with  those  pertaining  to  a 
centre  of  civic  activity.  This  club  provides  a  forum  for  the 
discussion  of  municipal  questions,  maintains  several  active 
committees,  examines  and  makes  known  the  records  of  candi- 
dates for  public  office,  follows  up  complaints  made  by  citizens 
against  officials,  furnishes  briefs  to  members  of  the  legisla- 
ture advising  them  of  its  attitude  on  all  measures  relating 
to  New  York  City,  and  issues  a  monthly  bulletin  which  gives 
due  publicity  to  its  work.  Clubs  modelled  along  similar 
lines  have  since  been  established  in  Chicago,  Philadelphia, 
St.  Louis,  Boston,  Milwaukee,  Indianapolis,  Los  Angeles, 


376  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

and  other  cities.  The  greatest  service  rendered  by  these 
societies  consists  in  providing  a  rallying-point  for  all  those 
who  are  interested  in  municipal  progress,  no  matter  what 
particular  form  their  interest  may  assume.  When  main- 
tained upon  a  popular  basis,  they  serve  to  bring  into  direct 
personal  contact  men  who  represent  every  element  in  the 
citizenship  of  the  community.  By  thus  broadening  the 
realm  of  mutual  acquaintanceship  and  encouraging  the 
interchange  of  ideas,  they  have  become  highly  useful  insti- 
tutions of  civic  education. 

In  enumerating  the  organized  forces  of  civic  improvement 
one  should  make  particular  mention  of  the  various  bureaus  of 
research  now  in  operation  in  a  dozen  or  more  of  the  larger 
cities  of  the  United  States.  These  institutions,  organized 
more  or  less  closely  upon  the  model  of  the  parent  bureau  in 
New  York  City,  are  a  development  of  the  last  decade  in 
American  municipal  government.  Sometimes,  as  in  New 
York  and  Philadelphia,  they  are  supported  by  private 
contributions  and  are  under  the  control  of  citizen  trustees  or 
directors.  In  other  cities,  as  in  Baltimore,  Boston,  and 
Milwaukee,  they  are  maintained  by  public  funds  and  are 
under  official  direction.  In  either  case  the  bureau  is  an 
institution  for  the  thorough  study  of  actual  conditions  in 
its  own  city ;  it  possesses  a  staff  of  investigators  who  probe 
their  way  into  every  branch  of  the  municipal  service  and 
emerge  with  data  upon  which  they  base  recommendations 
for  improvement.  The  New  York  bureau,  which  is  the 
oldest  among  them,  has  completed  six  years  of  work 
covering  a  wide  range  and  carried  on  at  a  very  large  annual 
expense.  It  has  published  a  formidable  amount  of  literature.1 

1 A  complete  account  of  its  work  may  be  found  in  the  publication  en- 
titled Six  Years  of  Municipal  Research  for  New  York  City,  issued  in  January, 
1912.  See  also  the  chapter  on  "An  Agency  of  Citizen  Inquiry"  in  P.  A. 
Cleveland's  Municipal  Administration  and  Accounting  (New  York,  1909). 


MUNICIPAL   REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  377 

These  bureaus  take  it  upon  themselves  to  act  as  public  ad-  Principle 
visers  in  matters  that  are,  for  the  most  part,  too  complicated  these  W 


and  too  technical  for  the  public  to  understand  and  form 
opinions  upon  without  assistance.  Their  very  existence,  in 
fact,  rests  upon  the  idea  that  the  greater  part  of  the  city's 
business  is  technical,  and  hence  that  the  city's  treasury  com- 
monly suffers  more  from  leakages  due  to  inefficient  methods 
than  from  official  dishonesty.  They  assume,  quite  properly, 
that  before  these  leakages  can  be  stopped  their  exact  loca- 
tion must  be  disclosed,  and  believe  that  this  is  a  task 
involving  patient  study  by  trained  men.  After  the  sources 
of  waste  have  been  plainly  indicated  to  the  voters  by  con- 
vincing evidence,  public  opinion,  they  declare,  may  be  trusted 
to  exert  all  the  pressure  that  is  needed  to  effect  a  reform. 
In  a  word,  the  bureau  of  municipal  research  aims  to  provide 
an  effective  centre  of  trustworthy  information  and  to  bring 
this  information  to  the  ears  of  every  citizen  by  a  persistent 
and  usually  a  somewhat  original  publicity  campaign. 

Taking  all  these  organizations  together,  national  and  Why  has  not 
local,  political,  semi-political,  and  non-political,  the  battal- 
ions  of  civic  betterment  make  up  an  impressive  array, 
Why  have  they  not  accomplished  more?  Why  does  city 
government  remain,  in  spite  of  their  efforts,  the  one  con- 
spicuous failure  of  the  American  democracy?  These  are 
questions  easier  to  propound  than  to  answer,  though  some 
of  the  superficial  reasons  for  the  habitual  failure  of  reform 
to  achieve  tangible  results  are  not  far  to  seek. 

In  the  first  place,  until  very  recent  years  most  organized  its  lack  of 

F  i      i    .1  -  f  -i        attention  to 

reform  movements  approached  things  from  a  wrong  angle.  fundamen- 
They  complacently  accepted  the  stupefying  formulas  of  local  tajs' 
government  which  they  found  in  full  sway,  being  always  at 
great  pains  to  forestall  any  possible  public  misgivings  by 
professing  their  allegiance  to  the  principle  of  divided  powers 
and  other  such  orthodox  canons  of  political  science.     They 


378  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

assured  the  citizens  that  the  existing  machinery  of  city 
government  was  not  seriously  defective,  but  that  the  trouble 
lay  wholly  with  the  men  who  were  in  control  of  it.  In  their 
eyes,  therefore,  the  obvious  remedy  was  to  oust  from  office 
those  whose  incompetence  or  lack  of  integrity  had  befouled 
the  administration,  and  to  put  capable,  honest,  high-prin- 
cipled men  in  their  room.1  Not  the  reconstruction  but  the 
purification  of  municipal  politics  was  long  the  goal  of  reform. 
But  campaigns  of  civic  betterment  starting  from  this  assump- 
tion and  aiming  at  this  result  inevitably  found  themselves 
confronted  with  great  difficulties.  For  one  thing,  men  in 
office  were  not  easy  to  dislodge;  so  long  as  patronage  was 
abundant,  elective  office-holders  held  their  opponents  under 
a  serious  handicap.  For  another  thing,  the  "  honest,  public- 
spirited,  capable,  and  well-trained  men"  whom  it  was  deemed 
so  imperative  to  put  into  power  almost  always  proved  to  be 
of  the  type  which  looks  upon  all  public  service  as  a  private 
sacrifice.  They  were  hard  to  draw  into  the  arena  of  munic- 
ipal politics,  and  rarely  proved  to  be  good  campaigners 
when  they  got  there.  The  very  existence  of  this  situation 
should  have  been  ample  proof  to  the  leaders  of  reform  that 
they  were  proceeding  on  a  faulty  diagnosis.  There  are  times, 
no  doubt,  when,  from  no  fault  of  the  scheme  of  administra- 
tion, circumstances  may  for  the  moment  be  such  as  to  deter 
capable  men  from  willingly  entering  the  service  of  the  city. 
But  when  such  a  situation  becomes  normal,  when  year  in  and 
year  out  the  efficient  service  of  society  means  personal  sacri- 
fice even  to  men  of  proved  public  spirit,  the  trouble  cannot 
lie  anywhere  else  than  in  the  conditions  under  which  the 
service  has  to  be  performed.  The  cause  of  reform  was  long 

1  In  1894  the  Honorable  Carl  Schurz,  one  of  the  most  valiant  of  munici- 
pal reformers,  declared  that  there  was  "not  a  municipal  government  in 
this  country,  on  whatever  pattern  organized,"  which  would  "not  work  well 
when  administered  by  honest,  public-spirited,  capable,  and  well-trained 
men"  (National  Municipal  League,  Proceedings,  1894,  p.  123). 


MUNICIPAL  REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  379 

misguided,  therefore,  by  the  notion  that  municipal  ills  were 
personal  matters,  whereas  in  point  of  fact  they  lay  far  beyond 
the  mere  personnel  of  city  government.  They  were  organic, 
and  their  ravages  continued  despite  year-to-year  changes  in 
the  occupancy  of  official  posts. 

Efforts  inspired  by  the  belief  that  individuals  and  not  insti-  Reform  to 
tutions  were  at  fault  naturally  led  to  sterility  in  results.  At  fSmusfbe 
times  the  reform  organizations  managed,  in  spite  of  handicaps,  or«anic- 
to  put  their  nominees  in  municipal  office ;  then  they  would 
rest  upon  their  weapons  to  await  the  promised  millennium. 
But  the  anticipated  results  were  rarely  forthcoming.  The 
mechanic,  however  capable  and  honest,  found  that  he  could 
not  do  effective  work  with  the  tools  that  were  at  hand.  The 
political  shackles  imposed  upon  the  reform  official  in  the 
performance  of  his  functions,  the  maze  of  legal  restrictions 
that  he  encountered  at  every  turn,  the  small  modicum  of  real 
power  intrusted  to  him,  all  combined  to  thwart  his  efforts 
at  constructive  work.  In  a  whole  term  of  office,  therefore,  he 
was  usually  able  to  accomplish  no  more  than  some  penny- 
saving  improvements  which  were  far  from  redeeming  the 
preelection  promises  so  freely  made  by  reform  campaigners.1 

In  due  time,  however,  the  need  of  organic  reform  obtained  organic 
recognition,  and  movements  for  the  simplification  of  munici-  ^ng  the 
pal  machinery  began.     New  York  made  a  start,  during  the  last  decade- 

1  "In  almost  every  American  city  the  people,  at  one  time  or  another, 
have  grown  weary  beyond  endurance  of  partisan  misrule  and  extravagance, 
and  have  given  expression  to  their  indignation  through  some  form  of  citi- 
zens' movement,  and  good  men  of  clean  records  have  been  given  control  of 
city  affairs.  What  has  been  the  result  ?  The  new  officers  have  invariably 
found  a  system  of  government  so  honeycombed  with  the  greed  and  selfish- 
ness of  partisan  politics  and  their  actions  so  hampered  by  state  legislation 
that  no  permanent  good  could  be  done.  The  people  were  impatient  for 
results,  and  when  not  forthcoming,  their  enthusiasm  waned,  the  tidal  wave 
of  reform  receded,  the  politicians  quietly  planned  the  next  campaign,  and 
the  unworthy  and  incompetent  resumed  control  of  the  great  public  estate." 
—  T.  C.  DEVLIN,  Municipal  Reform  in  the  United  States  (New  York,  1896), 
13. 


380  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN   CITIES 

last  decade  of  the  nineteenth  century,  with  its  agitation  for 
thoroughgoing  charter  changes;  and  other  cities,  like  St. 
Louis,  San  Francisco,  and  Boston,  followed.  In  smaller 
cities  the  striking  success  of  the  commission-government 
propaganda  was  not  long  in  showing  the  extent  to  which 
public  opinion  had  become  intolerant  of  remedies  that  did 
not  go  to  the  very  vitals  of  the  existing  municipal  system. 
All  this  proves  that  reform  has  entered  a  new  phase,  and 
one  which  gives  promise  of  far  more  in  the  way  of  achieve- 
ment. Not  only  the  leaders  of  opinion  but  the  rank  and 
file  of  municipal  electorates  have  been  brought  to  realize 
that  reform  is  not  merely  a  question  of  putting  capable  and 
honest  men  in  office,  but  more  particularly  one  of  making 
offices  attractive  to  capable  and  honest  men.  People  are 
coming  to  see  that  they  can  make  public  office  attractive 
only  by  attaching  to  it  an  opportunity  for  real,  unre- 
stricted, constructive  service  to  the  community,  and  that 
they  can  do  this  only  by  renouncing,  first  of  all,  that 
slavish  allegiance  to  the  principle  of  checks  and  balances 
in  local  government,  as  well  as  to  other  political  formulas, 
which  for  the  last  half-century  has  done  nothing  but  mis- 
guide. The  magnetism  of  official  power  is  so  great  that 
few  men  in  any  community  can  resist  its  attraction;  but 
it  must  be  real  power  and  not  merely  the  form  of  it.  If  the 
pattern  of  city  government  becomes  such  as  to  afford  to  every 
elective  officer  that  opportunity  which  goes  with  power, 
most  of  the  difficulties  that  beset  the  paths  of  reform  organi- 
zations in  earlier  years  will  disappear.  Reform  has  gained 
in  effectiveness  as  it  has  become  impersonal,  organic,  and 
reconstructive.  Unlike  the  guerilla  warfare  of  earlier  days, 
the  charter  reform  campaigns  of  the  last  decade  have  been 
well  worth  the  efforts  expended  in  them. 

To  secure  even  temporary  improvements  in  city  adminis- 
tration is  good,  but  to  make  them  permanent  is  better. 


MUNICIPAL   REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  381 

Reform  which  aspires  to  finality  must  not  content  itself,  Reform  of 
therefore,  with  a  mere  reorganization  of  the  political  frame- 
work  of  municipalities.  To  suppose  that  a  good  charter  * 
and  a  staff  of  capable  officials  are  the  only  things  essential 
to  an  efficient  and  thrifty  municipal  administration  is  to 
overlook  the  fact  that  most  of  the  city's  difficult  problems 
are  questions  of  business  and  not  of  government.  Even 
the  best  city  charter  provides  for  but  a  small  part  of  the 
machinery  necessary  to  solve  these  problems  correctly ;  the 
rest  of  the  apparatus,  which  includes  the  whole  interior 
mechanism  of  administration,  must  be  sought  within  the 
range  of  general  powers  conferred  by  the  charter.  It  is 
just  here,  as  has  already  been  noticed,  that  the  shortcomings 
of  municipal  administration  have  been  most  numerous  and 
most  costly.  When  a  private  corporation  proves  successful 
in  the  conduct  of  affairs,  the  reason  is  usually  to  be  found 
not  in  the  nature  of  the  powers  conferred  upon  it  by  charter, 
or  even  in  the  capacity  or  honesty  of  the  men  who  sit  upon 
its  directorate,  but  rather  in  the  efficiency  of  its  internal 
organization,  in  the  skill  with  which  it  has  adjusted  the 
various  parts  of  the  business  machine,  and  the  ability 
which  it  has  shown  in  getting  the  right  subordinate  in  the 
right  place.  If  the  city  desires  administrative  success,  it 
must  seek  it  in  the  same  way.  Reformers  must  realize, 
therefore,  that  a  final  solution  of  the  chief  municipal  prob- 
lem of  the  American  city,  that  of  getting  full  value  for 
the  city's  expenditures,  depends  even  more  upon  the 
intelligent  organization  of  business  details  than  upon  the 
mere  enunciation  of  sound  political  principles  in  city  char- 
ters. Too  little  attention  has  been  given,  and  is  still  given, 
to  the  functioning  mechanism  of  city  government,  to  those 
things  which  in  private  business  engage  the  care  and  skill 
of  the  efficiency  engineer ;  but  this  will  not  be  the  case  much 
longer.  The  bureaus  of  research  that  have  come  into  exist- 


382  GOVERNMENT  OP  AMERICAN  CITIES 

ence  during  recent  years  are  pointing  the  way  to  thorough- 
going, permanent  reform  in  this  direction. 

All  that  has  been  written  in  the  last  half-dozen  pages  may 
be  compressed  into  the  assertion  that  municipal  reform  has 
"reformer."  been  siow  m  achieving  substantial  results  because  it  took  a 
surprisingly  long  time  to  get  itself  into  motion  along  the 
right  track.  But  other  factors  have  frequently  helped  to 
keep  reform  movements  from  tangible  and  permanent 
achievement.  In  earlier  days,  when  reform  had  little  more 
in  view  than  the  ousting  of  politicians  from  municipal  office, 
the  typical  reformer  was  either  a  disgruntled  politician  who 
sought  to  elbow  his  way  into  public  office  on  a  platform  of 
cant,  or  a  henheaded  theorist  whose  temperament  contained 
very  few  grains  of  practical  political  sense.  In  campaigns 
directed  against  persons  the  chief  weapon  of  the  reformer 
was  personal  invective.  Absolutely  sure  that  a  successful 
crusade  against  corrupt  or  incompetent  aldermen  would 
result  in  setting  everything  right,  the  reformer  took  in  his 
hand  the  sword  of  vituperation  and  sallied  forth  to  his  quix- 
otic conflict.  Loud  in  his  professions  of  non-partisanship, 
he  was  in  many,  cases  a  bigoted  partisan  of  his  own  class  or 
creed  or  theory.  Not  less  vehement  in  his  protestations  of 
public  spiritedness  and  denials  of  self-interest,  he  was  just  as 
often  spurred  forward  by  motives  that  appeared  unselfish 
to  no  mind  but  his  own.  Even  at  the  present  time  the  cause 
of  municipal  reform  numbers  among  its  chief  supporters  in 
every  large  city  many  men  of  this  type.  That  they  do  not 
themselves  realize  the  incongruity  of  the  situation  is  some- 
thing that  passes  understanding.  Yet  the  fact  remains 
that  a  municipal  reform  league  or  a  taxpayers'  association 
will  choose  as  its  president  the  paid  counsel  of  a  public- 
service  corporation,  and  still  expect  the  average  voter  to 
swallow  assurances  that  the  organization  has  no  connection 
with  the  seekers  of  special  privilege.  The  way  in  which 


MUNICIPAL  REFORM  AND  REFORMERS  383 

the  outstanding  figure  in  any  political  undertaking  will 
strike  the  public  imagination  is  something  which  party 
strategists  never  neglect  to  take  into  account.  In  the  coun- 
cils of  reform,  on  the  contrary,  this  consideration,  despite 
its  important  bearing  upon  the  chances  of  success,  often 
receives  no  attention  whatever. 

Municipal  reform  has,  moreover,  suffered  from  the  lack  inherent 
of  team  play  among  its  friends.  Reformers,  as  a  recent  Of  reform" 
writer  has  well  said,  are  primarily  protestants,  and  it  is  the  °^mza" 
nature  of  protestants  to  be  insubordinate.1  It  is  tempera- 
mental inability  to  tolerate  the  existing  situation  that  makes 
a  man  a  reformer ;  and  it  is  the  same  trait  that  makes  him, 
as  a  rule,  intolerant  of  all  ideas  except  his  own.  Reformers 
can  always  agree  upon  basic  principles,  for  these  are  commonly 
framed  in  such  platitudinous  form  that  even  the  most  arrant 
political  pirate  would  not  refuse  open  assent  to  them.  But, 
as  occasion  arises  for  elaborating  these  principles  into 
working  rules  of  administration,  it  forthwith  becomes  ap- 
parent that  each  reformer  has  his  own  interpretation 
of  them,  and  that  all  who  disagree  with  him  are  lacking 
in  either  intelligence  or  integrity  or  in  both.  Across  the 
history  of  nearly  every  municipal  reform  movement  of  the 
last  twenty  years  may  be  found  written  the  tedious  chronicle 
of  bickerings  due  to  personal  jealousy,  class  bigotry,  and 
the  failure  of  reformers  to  realize  that  vindictiveness  has  no 
place  in  the  programme  of  a  political  agitation  which  seeks 
to  be  successful. 

From  the  experiences  of  the  past  reform  organizations  The 
can  draw  abundant  counsel  for  future  action.     To  secure 
achievements  of  permanent  value  they  must  seek  far  more 
than  mere  change  in  the  personnel  of  city  government. 
They  must  simplify  the  political  framework  where  necessary, 

1  Herbert  Croly,  The  Promise  of  the  American  Life  (New  York,  1909), 
146. 


384  GOVERNMENT  OF  AMERICAN  CITIES 

and  make  it  afford  those  opportunities  for  constructive 
effort  which  are  the  only  enduring  attractions  of  public 
service.  They  must  adjust  the  administrative  machinery 
of  the  city  to  the  work  which  it  is  called  upon  to  do,  a  mission 
which  in  any  large  city  is  a  reform  task  of  herculean  propor- 
tions and  of  corresponding  value  when  performed.  If 
laborers  in  the  cause  of  civic  improvement  desire  to  see  in 
concrete  form  the  results  of  their  exertions,  they  must  also 
adjust  their  methods  to  the  conditions  of  political  warfare  in  a 
democracy ;  which  means  specifically  that  they  must  recog- 
nize the  utter  weakness  of  a  house  divided  against  itself, 
the  impotence  of  purist  professions  that  do  not  square  with 
the  facts,  and  the  unerring  certainty  with  which  extravagant 
pledges  return  to  work  injury  upon  those  who  promise,  in  the 
way  of  public  improvement,  more  than  they  can  ever  fulfil. 
Municipal  development  during  the  last  ten  or  twelve 
years  seems  to  show  that  the  lessons  of  preceding  decades 
have  not  been  altogether  unheeded.  Though  stumbling 
badly  at  times,  municipal  reform  has  persevered,  until  by 
sheer  persistence  it  has  conquered  many  of  the  obstacles 
in  its  path.  Similar  patience  and  perseverance  it  will  have 
to  exercise  for  a  long  time  to  come ;  but  the  outlook  has  never 
been  more  encouraging  than  it  is  to-day. 

REFERENCES 

The  literature  of  municipal  reform  is  already  large,  and  it  is  steadily 
growing.  The  annual  Proceedings  of  the  National  Municipal  League  (18 
vols.,  1894-1912)  form  the  most  comprehensive  single  source  of  information 
on  the  history  and  methods  of  reform  during  the  last  two  decades.  Much 
interesting  material  relating  to  the  progress  of  reform  movements  during 
the  nineties  may  be  found  in  the  files  of  the  periodical  known  as  Municipal 
Affairs,  which  appeared  during  the  years  1897-1902.  In  following  the 
history  of  civil-service  reform  one  finds  of  great  value  the  monthly  issues 
of  Good  Government  (published  in  New  York)  and  the  annual  reports  of 
the  National  Civil  Service  Reform  League  and  of  the  civil-service  com- 
missions in  various  states.  The  bulletins  issued  from  time  to  time  by  the 
American  Civic  Association,  and  the  publications  of  state  municipal 


MUNICIPAL  REFORM  AND   REFORMERS  385 

associations  or  of  state  leagues  of  municipalities,  sometimes  deal  carefully 
with  special  phases  of  municipal  reform  and  are  of  permanent  value.  In 
many  of  the  larger  cities  there  are  municipal-reform  periodicals  which 
appear  monthly  or  oftener,  such  as  City  Affairs  in  Boston,  the  Citizens' 
Bulletin  in  Cincinnati,  the  Municipal  League  News  in  Seattle,  the  Civic 
Bulletin  in  St.  Louis,  the  Civic  Bulletin  in  Pittsburgh,  Pa.,  and  the  Munic- 
ipal Bulletin  in  Cleveland.  Likewise  the  regular  bulletins  of  the  city  clubs 
in  Philadelphia,  Boston,  Chicago,  and  elsewhere  furnish  to  some  extent 
a  chronicle  of  municipal  happenings  in  these  cities.  Most  useful  of  all, 
because  most  thorough  in  preparation,  are  the  publications  of  such  institu- 
tions as  the  New  York  Bureau  of  Municipal  Research,  the  Milwaukee 
Bureau  of  Economy  and  Efficiency,  the  Legislative  Reference  Department 
of  the  Wisconsin  Free  Library  Commission,  the  Boston  Finance  Commis- 
sion, the  Philadelphia  Bureau  of  Municipal  Research,  and  the  Chicago 
Bureau  of  Public  Efficiency. 

The  chief  general  periodicals  devoting  their  attention  to  municipal 
affairs  in  the  United  States  are  the  National  Municipal  Review,  which  is 
issued  quarterly,  the  American  City  published  monthly,  the  Municipal 
Journal  and  Engineer  which  appears  weekly.  A  list  of  other  periodical 
publications  relating  to  American  city  government  may  be  found  in  the 
National  Municipal  Review,  I.  406-410  (July,  1912). 

Books  relating  to  special  fields  of  municipal  reform,  such  as  commission 
government,  direct  legislation,  the  short  ballot,  the  replanning  of  cities, 
and  so  forth,  are  numerous,  and  nearly  all  the  general  works  on  municipal 
government  contain  some  discussion  of  reform  movements.  Most  of  these 
have  been  mentioned  in  preceding  pages.  Two  small  monographs, 
T.  C.  Devlin's  Municipal  Reform  in  the  United  States  (New  York,  1896) 
and  W.  H.  Tolman's  Municipal  Reform  Movements  in  the  United  States 
(New  York,  1895),  are  more  definite  in  scope,  but  are  not  of  any  con- 
siderable value  at  the  present  time. 


2c 


ABATEMENTS,  of  taxes,  powers  of  city 
council  in  relation  to,  200. 

Abbott,  Grace,  "The  Immigrant  and 
Municipal  Politics,"  35n. 

Accident,  death  by,  excess  of  in  large 
cities,  41. 

Adams,  H.  C.,  Public  Debts,  124. 

Administrative  Departments,  inde- 
pendence of,  in  American  cities, 
237 ;  general  organization  of,  238- 
242 ;  relation  of  civil  service  to, 
243-245 ;  methods  of  selecting 
heads  for,  245—248 ;  methods  of 
removing  heads  of,  249-250 ;  num- 
ber of,  in  American  cities,  250-251 ; 
distribution  of  work  among,  252- 
253  ;  advantages  of  board  system  in 
organization  of,  253-257 ;  advan- 
tages of  single-head  system  in, 
257-258 ;  salaries  paid  to  heads  of, 
259-260 ;  faulty  internal  organiza- 
tion of,  in  most  cities,  260-263. 

Age,  distribution  of  population  accord- 
ing to,  30-32. 

Alabama,  admission  of  non-citizens 
to  voting  rights  in,  107;  exclusion 
of  negroes  from  suffrage  by  laws 
of,  113. 

Albany,  first  charter  of  (1686),  2; 
early  powers  of  mayor  in,  208. 

Aldermen,  method  of  choosing  in 
colonial  boroughs,  4 ;  positions  and 
powers  of,  before  the  Revolution, 
181 ;  boards  of,  how  organized, 
188;  confirmation  of  appointment 
by,  227-229.  See  also  City  Council. 

Aliens,  strength  of,  in  the  population 
of  American  cities,  32-37. 

Allen,  Philip,  L.,  "  Ballot  Laws  and 
their  Workings,"  143n,  152. 

Allison,  E.  P.,  and  Penrose,  B.,  History 
of  Philadelphia,  On,  lln,  13n,  28. 

American  Civic  Association,  its  aims 
and  work,  360-361. 

Andreas,  A.  T.,  History  of  Chicago,  28. 

Annapolis,  first  charter  of  (1696),  2; 
as  an  example  of  a  close  corpora- 
tion, 4. 


Appointments,  municipal,  powers  of 
city  council  in  relation  to,  204; 
aldermanic  confirmation  of,  abol- 
ished in  Brooklyn  (1882),  212; 
powers  of  mayor  to  make,  226- 
232 ;  under  the  Galveston  plan, 
297 ;  under  the  Des  Moines  plan, 
299.  See  also  Administrative  De- 
partments, Mayor,  Merit  System, 
Employees,  Municipal. 

Appropriations,  powers  of  city  council 
in  matters  of,  200-201 ;  control  of 
mayor  over,  232-234 ;  provisions 
in  commission  charters  relating  to, 
315-316. 

Arkansas,  admission  of  non-citizens 
to  voting  rights  in,  107 ;  provisions 
for  direct  legislation  in  the  con- 
stitution of,  327n. 

Armenians,  drift  of,  to  large  cities  in 
America,  33. 

Arrondissement,  in  France,  compared 
with  the  American  ward,  191. 

Assessors,  work  of,  in  compiling  munici- 
pal voters'  lists,  116. 

Austin,  Texas,  adoption  of  commis- 
sion government  by,  298. 

Australia,  form  of  ballot  derived  from, 
142-143. 

BABSON,  T.  M.,  Statutes  relating  to  the 
City  of  Boston,  61n. 

Baker,  M.  N.,  Municipal  Engineering 
and  Sanitation,  263. 

Baldwin,  S.  E.,  Modern  Political 
Institutions,  101. 

Ballotage,  system  of,  in  Europe,  102. 

Ballots,  municipal,  early  history  of, 
in  America,  142 ;  introduction  of 
Australian,  143;  growth  of,  to 
unwieldiness,  143 ;  improvements 
in,  144 ;  movements  for  the  shorten- 
ing of,  145-146 ;  preferential,  147- 
148 ;  order  of  names  on,  149 ;  used 
at  elections  of  city  councillors, 
194-195. 

Baltimore,  charter  of  (1796),  7;  popu- 
lation of,  in  1790,  9 ;  state  control 


387 


388 


INDEX 


of  police  established  in  (1860),  15; 
present  state  control  of  municipal 
police  in,  75,  211,  246-247;  state 
and  city  elections  held  on  the  same 
day  in,  141 ;  retains  bicameral 
system,  185;  charter  of  1797  in, 
208;  origin  of  mayoral  veto  in, 
209 ;  length  of  mayor's  term  in, 
213 ;  qualifications  for  mayor  in, 
215 ;  mayor's  veto  power  in,  223 ; 
popular  election  of  certain  adminis- 
trative officials  in,  245n. ;  Bureau 
of  Municipal  Research  in,  376. 

Barnett,  J.  D.,  "The  Operation  of  the 
Recall  in  Oregon,"  355n. 

Beale,  J.  H.,  Selection  of  Cases  on 
Municipal  Corporations,  53n,  81n, 
83n,  92n,  94n,  95n,  97n,  98n,  101, 
264. 

Beard,  C.  A.,  Digest  of  Short  Ballot 
Charters,  79,  149n,  292,  302n,  319, 
328n,  352n,  356;  "The  Ballot's 
Burden,"  152,  345n. 

Beard,  C.  A.,  and  Shultz,  B.  E.,  Docu- 
ments on  the  State-wide  Initiative, 
Referendum,  and  Recall,  327n,  339n, 
356n. 

Bemis,  E.  W.,  Local  Government  in  the 
South  and  Southwest,  27n. 

Bennet,  W.  S.,  "The  Effect  of  Immi- 
gration on  Politics,"  35n. 

Bicameral  system,  introduced  after 
the  Revolution,  6-7;  adopted  by 
New  York  City  hi  1830,  10. 

Birmingham,  phenomenal  growth  in 
population  of,  since  1900,  26. 

Birth  rates,  in  urban  and  rural  com- 
munities, 37-38. 

Bishop,  C.  F.,  History  of  Elections  in 
the  American  Colonies,  152. 

Bismarck,  on  public  opinion  as  the 
foe  of  expertness,  306. 

Blackmar,  F.  W.,  "The  History  of 
Suffrage  Legislation  in  the  United 
States,"  105n,  124. 

Blackstone,  Sir  YPilliam,  transmitter 
of  Montesquieu's  doctrines,  225. 

Board  of  Estimate  and  Apportionment, 
in  New  York  City,  233. 

Board  of  Trade,  in  England,  74. 

Boards,  administrative,  work  of  coun- 
cil committees  superseded  by,  240; 
advantages  of,  over  single  com- 
missioners, 253-257. 

Boroughs,  in  the  American  colonies, 
2-5;  methods  of  granting  charters 
to,  in  England,  3 ;  colonial,  organi- 
zation of  councils  in,  180-181 ;  posi- 
tion of  mayor  in,  207-208. 


Borrowing,  municipal.     See  Loans. 

Bosses,  municipal,  their  influence  and 
methods,  174-178. 

Boston,  importance  of,  as  a  colonial 
town,  4;  first  charter  of  (1822),  9; 
population  of,  in  1790  and  1822,  9; 
state  control  of  police  established 
in  (1885),  19;  nomination  by  peti- 
tion in,  23,  194;  death  rate  of,  in 
1700  and  1900,  39;  special  legis- 
lation concerning,  61 ;  state  super- 
vision of  public  utilities  in  the 
metropolitan  district  of,  66;  fre- 
quency of  proposals  to  amend  the 
new  charter  of,  67-68 ;  state  con- 
trol of  municipal  police  in,  75, 
246-247 ;  evasion  of  poll-taxes  in, 
115;  methods  of  enrolling  voters 
in,  116;  system  of  nomination  by 
petition  in,  136-138 ;  state  and 
municipal  elections  held  on  different 
days  in,  141 ;  abolition  of  party 
designations  on  ballots  used  in, 
144-145;  changes  made  by  char- 
ters of  1854  and  1885  in  the  govern- 
ment of,  184 ;  adopts  single-cham- 
bered council,  185;  number  of 
members  in  city  council  of,  188; 
caliber  of  councilmen  in,  189 ;  sal- 
aries of  councilmen  in,  190 ;  aboli- 
tion of  ward  system  in,  191 ;  sys- 
tem of  minority  representation  in, 
193 ;  number  of  committees  in 
old  council  of,  196 ;  checks  on  ap- 
propriating powers  of  city  council 
in,  201 ;  popular  election  of  mayor 
provided  for  in  first  charter  of, 
209-210;  comparative  powers  of 
mayor  and  city  council  in,  212 ; 
length  of  mayor's  term  in,  213 ; 
salary  of  mayor  in,  218 ;  expenses 
of  candidates  for  mayoralty  in, 
219 ;  checks  on  mayor's  appoint- 
ing power  in,  230-232 ;  method  of 
making  budget  in,  233-234;  selec- 
tion of  heads  of  departments  in, 
241 ;  scope  of  mayor's  appointing 
power  in,  246 ;  appointment  of 
Franklin  Fund  trustees  by  judges 
in,  247-248 ;  removal  of  depart- 
ment heads  by  mayor  in,  249 ; 
number  of  administrative  depart- 
ments in,  251 ;  proportion  of  munic- 
ipal employees  to  registered  voters 
in,  266 ;  appointments  to  police 
force  under  merit  system  in,  288; 
scrutiny  of  municipal  pay-rolls  by 
state  civil  service  commission  in, 
289 ;  character  of  old  city  council 


INDEX 


389 


in,  307-308;  quest  of  signatures 
for  nomination  petitions  in,  343n; 
attempt  to  recall  mayor  in,  351n; 
number  of  betterment  organizations 
in,  364 ;  Citizens'  Municipal  League 
in,  366;  Good  Government  Asso- 
ciation of,  370;  City  Club  of, 
375. 

Boston  Finance  Commission,  its 
methods,  78;  on  the  work  of  city 
councils,  204-205. 

Bourne,  Jonathan,  Jr.,  "A  Defence  of 
Direct  Legislation,"  339n. 

Bradford,  E.  S.,  Commission  Govern- 
ment in  American  Cities,  149n, 
251n,  296n,  299n,  317n,  319,  328n. 

Bradford,  G.,  Lesson  of  Popular  Gov- 
ernment, 357. 

Brookings,  W.  D.  B.,  and  Ringwalt, 
R.  C.,  Briefs  for  Debate,  124. 

Brooklyn,  state  police  control  over 
(1857),  14;  aldermanic  confirma- 
tions abolished  in  (1882),  212. 

Brooks,  R.  C.,  Corruption  in  American 
Politics  and  Life,  152. 

Bryce,  James,  The  American  Common- 
wealth, 16n,  11  In;  on  the  texture 
of  urban  population,  49. 

Budget,  of  New  York  City,  in  1820,  9 ; 
procedure  in  framing,  232-234. 

Buffalo,  retains  bicameral  system,  185 ; 
Grover  Cleveland  elected  mayor 
of,  217. 

Bureau  of  Municipal  Research,  in 
New  York  City,  work  of,  376. 
See  also  Philadelphia. 

Burgomaster,  powers  of,  compared 
with  mayors,  235. 

Burr,  Aaron,  obtains  water  franchise 
in  New  York  City,  10. 

Bushee,  F.  A.,  Ethnic  Factors  in  the 
Population  of  Boston,  52. 

Butler,  J.  A.,  "A  Single  or  a  Double 
Council,"  187n,  206. 

CALIFORNIA,  home-rule  charter  system 
in,  63 ;  illiteracy  a  bar  to  voting 
rights  in,  1 12 ;  first  attempts  to 
regulate  caucuses  and  conventions 
in  (1866),  128. 

Canada,  methods  of  nominating  mu- 
nicipal officers  in,  138. 

Capen,  8.  B.,  "Shall  we  have  One  or 
Two  Legislative  Chambers?",  187n, 
206. 

Caucus,  use  of  in  earlier  stages  of 
municipal  development,  126 ;  its 
abuses,  127 ;  use  of  in  city  councils, 
195. 


Cemeteries,  municipal,  liability  of  mu- 
nicipal corporations  for  torts  of  em- 
ployees in,  96. 

Charming,  E.,  Town  and  County  Gov- 
ernment in  the  English  Colonies  of 
North  America,  27. 

Chapman,  J.  J.,  Causes  and  Conse- 
quences, 179. 

Charleston,  population  of,  in  1790,  9. 

Charters,  of  colonial  boroughs,  2—5 ; 
changes  in  after  the  Revolution, 
5-6;  home-rule,  provisions  for, 
in  state  constitutions,  54 ;  granting 
of,  by  special  law,  55 ;  rules  of  the 
New  York  constitution  relating  to, 
59;  methods  of  drafting,  munici- 
pal, 76—79 ;  rules  concerning  in- 
terpretation of,  80-82 ;  absence  of 
business  provisions  in,  202-203. 

Chase,  H.  N.,  A  Report  to  His  Excel- 
lency the  Governor  of  Massachusetts 
.  .  .  concerning  .  .  .  Municipal 
Debts  and  Revenue,  73n. 

Chicago,  rise  of  separate  administra- 
tive departments  in,  13 ;  state 
police  control  established  in  (1861), 
15 ;  administrative  changes  in, 
during  early  seventies,  16-17 ; 
strength  of  foreign-born  element  in 
population  of,  33 ;  political  ten- 
dencies of  foreign-born  voters  in, 
36-37 ;  protection  against  special 
legislation  for,  in  the  constitution 
of  Illinois,  59-60 ;  street  railway 
situation  in,  66-67 ;  representation 
of  voters  in,  117;  state  and  city 
elections  held  on  different  dates 
in,  141 ;  maintains  single-chambered 
council,  185 ;  number  of  members 
in  city  council  of,  188;  salaries  of 
councilmen  in,  190 ;  retention  of 
ward  system  in,  191 ;  mayor  pre- 
sides at  council  meetings  in,  195, 
221 ;  output  of  council  ordinances 
in,  203 ;  state  police  control  pro- 
vided for,  211 ;  comparative  powers 
of  mayor  and  city  council  in,  212 ; 
length  of  mayor's  term  in,  213 ; 
salary  of  mayor  in,  218;  popular 
election  of  certain  administrative 
officials  in,  245n ;  appointment  of 
South  Park  Commissioners  by 
judges  in,  247 ;  number  of  adminis- 
trative departments  in,  251 ;  ad- 
ministration of  merit  system  in, 
277 ;  removals  of  employees  in, 
286 ;  Municipal  Voters'  League  of, 
367-369;  City  Club  of,  375; 
Board  of  Public  Efficiency  in,  376. 


390 


INDEX 


Childs,  R.  S.,  Short  Ballot  Principles, 
146n,  152,  345/1. 

Cincinnati,  state  control  of  municipal 
police  established  in  (1871),  19; 
strength  of  foreign-born  element  in 
population  of,  33. 

Citizens'  Union  of  New  York,  its  at- 
tempts to  divorce  state  and  munici- 
pal issues,  159-160;  its  transi- 
tory success,  161 ;  its  work,  365- 
366. 

Citizenship,  as  a  qualification  for  vot- 
ing, 106-107;  methods  of  obtain- 
ing, 107-109. 

City  clubs,  work  of  the,  375-376. 

City  planning,  increased  interest  in,  24. 

City  Planning  Conference,  aims  and 
work  of,  362. 

Civic  League  of  St.  Louis,  370. 

Civil  service,  objections  to  the  policy 
of  selecting  department  heads  un- 
der system  of,  243-245.  See  also 
Merit  System. 

Civil  service  reform,  campaign  for, 
started  by  Charles  Sumner,  17; 
progress  of,  during  period  1880- 
1895,  21. 

Civil  War,  effect  of,  on  relations  of 
state  to  cities,  15. 

Classification  of  cities,  in  Ohio,  55—56. 

Cleveland,  development  of  adminis- 
trative departments  in,  13 ;  its 
difficulties  under  the  uniform  code, 
57 ;  maintains  single-chambered 
council,  185 ;  Municipal  Associa- 
tion of,  370. 

Cleveland,  F.  A.,  Municipal  Adminis- 
tration and  Accounting,  201n,  274n, 
293,  376n;  Growth  of  Democracy 
in  the  United  States,  357. 

Cleveland,  Grover,  mayor  of  Buffalo, 
217. 

Clubs,  political,  in  New  York  and 
elsewhere,  163-164. 

"Colonization"  of  voters,  118. 

Commission,  government  by,  appoint- 
ing power  under,  229 ;  number 
of  departments  in  cities  under,  251 ; 
city  government  by,  294-320;  in- 
troduction of,  in  Galveston,  295— 
298;  in  Des  Moines,  299-301; 
principles  underlying,  302-304;  its 
merits,  304-310;  objections  to, 
311-316;  conclusions  on,  317- 
319.  See  also  Reform,  Municipal. 

Committees,  of  city  council,  their 
origin,  196 ;  power  of  presiding 
officer  in  naming,  197 ;  English 
and  American  system  of  compared, 


197-198 ;  administrative  function 
of,  in  early  stages  of  American  mu- 
nicipal development,  237-238. 

Commons,  John  R.,  "Labor  and 
Politics,"  293. 

Comptroller,  post  of,  established  and 
made  elective  in  Philadelphia  (1854), 
13. 

Confirmation.  See  Appointments,  Al- 
dermen. 

Congress,  power  of,  in  matters  of  nat- 
uralization, 106-107. 

Connecticut,  enacts  civil  service  re- 
form law  (1897),  21;  abolition  of 
property  qualification  for  voting 
in,  105 ;  educational  tests  required 
of  voters  in,  112. 

Constitution,  federal,  checks  on  state 
legislatures  in,  53-54. 

Constitutions,  state,  limitations  upon 
the  power  of  state  legislatures  to 
deal  with  cities  in,  54-56. 

Contract,  liability  of  municipal  cor- 
porations in  actions  of,  91. 

Conventions,  nomination  by,  126-127. 

Cook  County,  appointment  of  South 
Park  Commissioners,  by  judges 
of,  247. 

Corporations,  municipal,  composition 
of,  in  colonial  boroughs,  4 ;  change 
in  idea  of,  after  1775,  5 ;  municipal, 
derivative  nature  of,  53 ;  definition 
of,  80 ;  private  and  municipal 
compared,  81-82 ;  municipal,  pow- 
ers of,  82-83  ;  liability  of,  in  actions 
of  contract,  91 ;  liability  of,  in 
actions  of  tort,  91—99 ;  liability 
of,  for  management  of  property, 
98-99. 

Corrupt  practices,  securities  against, 
at  municipal  elections,  150-151. 

Councils,  city,  history  of,  in  colonial 
days,  180-181;  after  the  Revolu- 
tion, 181-182;  in  the  nineteenth 
century,  182-183 ;  loss  of  powers 
by,  184-185;  present  organization 
of,  185 ;  single  and  double  cham- 
bers compared,  185-187 ;  quali- 
fications for  election  to,  188-189; 
caliber  of  members  in,  189 ;  pay- 
ment of  members  in,  190 ;  method 
of  apportioning  representation  in, 
190-191 ;  evils  of  the  ward  system 
in  connection  with,  191-194 ; 
methods  of  nominating  and  elect- 
ing candidates  for  election  to, 
194-195 ;  procedure  at  meetings 
of,  195-196 ;  committee  system 
of,  196-197;  American  and  Eng- 


INDEX 


391 


lish  councils  compared,  197-198; 
powers  of,  198-206 ;  administra- 
tion through  committees  of,  237— 
239 ;  power  of,  to  remove  adminis- 
trative officials,  248 ;  character  of, 
in  Boston,  before  1909,  307-308; 
decline  in  caliber  of,  322. 

Councilmen,  method  of  choosing  in 
colonial  boroughs,  4. 

Courts,  appointment  of  municipal 
officers  by  the,  217-218. 

Crime,  ratio  of,  in  cities  and  urban 
districts,  45-46. 

Croly,  Herbert,  The  Promise  of  Ameri- 
can Life,  383n. 

Croton  aqueduct,  opened  in  1842, 
10. 

DABNET,  C.  W.,  "The  Illiteracy  of 
the  Voting  Population  in  the  United 
States,"  119n. 

Dallas,  A.  J.,  Laws  of  the  Common- 
wealth of  Pennsylvania,  6n. 

Dallas,  Texas,  rapid  growth  in  popula- 
tion of,  since  1911,  26;  extension  of 
commission  government  to,  298 ; 
use  of  recall  in,  355. 

Dallinger,  F.  W.,  Nominations  for 
Elective  Office,  128n,  151. 

Death  ratio  in  urban  and  rural  com- 
munities, 38—41. 

Debts,  increase  in  municipal,  during 
period  after  the  War,  19.  See  also 
Loans. 

Declaration  of  intention.  See  Nat- 
uralization. 

Delaware,  abolition  of  property  quali- 
fication for  voting  in,  105 ;  educa- 
tional tests  for  voting  in,  112. 

Delegation  of  legislative  power,  84. 

Deming,  H.  E.,  The  Government  of 
American  Cities,  79,  174n;  "The 
Legislature  in  City  and  State," 
206. 

Denver,  qualification  for  mayor  in, 
215 ;  use  of  direct  legislation  in, 
329. 

Des  Moines,  first  use  of  non-partisan 
primary  in,  131 ;  adoption  of  com- 
mission plan  by,  298 ;  provisions 
for  initiative,  referendum,  and  re- 
call in  charter  of,  299-300;  threat- 
ened use  of  recall  in,  355. 

Detroit,  charter  of  (1806),  7;  educa- 
tional qualification  exacted  from 
councilmen  in,  189 ;  merit  system 
in,  276. 

Devlin,  T.  C.,  Municipal  Reform  in  the 
United  States,  379n,  385. 


Dillon,  J.  F.,  The  Law  of  Municipal 
Corporations,  3n,  79,  80n,  81n,  85n, 
86n,  87n,  97n,  98n,  101,  199n,  264, 
276n,  293. 

Direct  legislation,  its  spread  in  Ameri- 
can cities,  23  ;  effect  of,  on  duties  of 
electorate,  103 ;  definition  of,  321- 
322 ;  reasons  for  the  spread  of,  in 
America,  322—323 ;  development 
of,  324-327 ;  in  actual  operation, 
329-330;  conditions  sought  to  be 
remedied  by,  331-333 ;  arguments 
in  favor  of,  334-339 ;  arguments 
against,  339-349 ;  general  conclu- 
sions concerning,  349-350. 

Disfranchisement  of  voters,   115. 

Disqualifications  from  voting,  115. 

Dodd,  W.  F.,  Revision  and  Amendment 
of  State  Constitutions,  324n,  357. 

Dongan,  Thomas,  governor  of  New 
York,  grants  first  charter  of  New 
York  City  (1686),  2. 

Drummond,  Henry,  on  the  making  of 
cities,  51. 

Durand,  E.  D.,  "Council  Govern- 
ment versus  Mayor  Government," 
206,  236. 

Durham,  John  George  Lambton,  first 
Earl  of,  on  popular  responsibility 
of  administrative  officers,  239-240. 

EATON,  A.  M.,  "The  Right  to  Local 
Self-Government,"  79. 

Eaton,  D.  B.,  The  Government  of  Mu- 
nicipalities, 162n,  236,  248n,  293; 
Civil  Service  in  Great  Britain, 
275n. 

Education,  municipal,  beginnings  of, 
10 ;  relative  progress  of,  in  rural 
and  urban  communities,  43—44. 

Elections,  time  of  holding  state  and 
municipal,  22 ;  municipal,  date  of 
holding,  139-140;  places  of  poll- 
ing at,  141 ;  ballots  used  in  connec- 
tion with,  142-143 ;  ballot  abuses 
at,  143-144;  desirability  of  shorter 
ballots  for,  145-146;  use  of  pref- 
erential ballots  in,  147-148;  order 
of  names  on  ballots  at,  149-150; 
securities  against  corrupt  practices 
at,  150-151.  See  also  Ballots, 
Municipal. 

Electorate,  municipal,  in  America  and 
and  Europe  compared,  102-104; 
its  importance,  102;  in  Europe  and 
America,  103-104:  history  of,  in 
America,  104-105 ;  composition  of, 
105-106;  organization  of,  in  early 
part  of  nineteenth  century,  104r- 


392 


INDEX 


106;  not  made  up  exclusively  of 
citizens,  106-107 ;  residence  as  a 
requirement  for  admission  to,  111- 
113;  illiterates  in,  112-114;  owner- 
ship of  property  by,  114;  payment 
of  poll-tax  by  members  of,  114- 
115;  disfranchisement  from,  115; 
methods  of  enrolling,  115-119;  pro- 
jects for  improving,  120-124. 

Electric  lighting  plants,  liability  of 
municipal  corporations  for  torts  of 
employees  in,  96. 

Eliot,  C.  W.,  American  Contributions 
to  Civilization,  124. 

Ellis,  W.  E.,  The  Municipal  Code  of 
Ohio,  56n,  79. 

El  Paso,  Texas,  extension  of  commis- 
sion government  to,  298. 

Employees,  municipal,  liability  of  mu- 
nicipal corporations  for  the  torts  of, 
91-99 ;  problems  connected  with, 
265 ;  number  of,  in  large  cities, 
265-266;  impossibility  of  dis- 
franchising, 267 ;  organization  of, 
in  administrative  departments,  268 ; 
political  influence  of,  269 ;  inferior 
caliber  of,  270-271 ;  dependence  of 
cities'  interests  on,  271-272 ;  com- 
pared with  private  employees,  272— 
273 ;  heavy  cost  arising  from  in- 
competence of,  274;  methods  of 
selecting,.  275-286;  methods  of 
protecting  against  unjust  removals, 
286-287;  inferior  quality  of,  288- 
290;  pensions  for,  290-292. 

England,  slow  increase  of  population 
in,  41 ;  basis  of  municipal  suffrage 
in,  121-122 ;  methods  of  nominat- 
ing municipal  officers  in,  138;  use 
of  Australian  ballot  in,  143 ;  pre- 
vention of  corrupt  practices  at 
municipal  elections  in,  150 ;  virtual 
identification  of  state  and  munici- 
pal parties  in,  158-159 ;  attitude 
of  voters  toward  election  campaigns 
in,  168 ;  continuance  of  committee 
system  in  cities  of,  184 ;  no  salary 
given  mayors  in  cities  of,  218; 
traditions  of  official  permanence 
in  cities  of,  245 ;  securities  against 
wrongful  removal  of  administrative 
officials  in  cities  of,  250 ;  traditions 
of  reappointment  in  cities  of,  269; 
origin  of  the  merit  system  in,  275 ; 
frame  of  city  government  in  cities 
of,  308 ;  organizations  of  municipal 
officials  in  cities  of,  363. 

Experts,  need  of,  in  American  cities, 
242. 


FAIRLIE,  J.  A.,  Municipal  Adminis- 
tration, 3n,  lOn,  28,  206,  236,  263; 
Essays  in  Municipal  Administra- 
tion, 28,  56n,  79,  188n,  206,  208, 
263,  293;  The  Centralization  of 
Administration  in  New  York  State, 
75n. 

Fanning,  C.  E.,  Selected  Articles  on 
Direct  Primaries,  152. 

Federal  analogy,  influence  of  the, 
after  the  Revolution,  7 ;  influence  of, 
in  Baltimore  charter  of  1797,  208. 

Fire  department,  immunity  of  mu- 
nicipal corporations  for  liability  for 
torts  of  employees  in,  93-94. 

Fire  protection,  by  volunteer  com- 
panies, 10. 

Fish,  C.  R.,  The  Civil  Service  and  the 
Patronage,  I8n,  2ln,  275n,  292. 

Fisher,  Irving,  Bulletin  of  the  Committee 
of  One  Hundred  on  National  Health, 
40n. 

Ford,  H.  J.,  The  Rise  and  Growth  of 
American  Politics,  18n,  179. 

Foreign  born,  in  American  cities,  32- 
37;  political  exploitation  of  voters 
among,  35-36. 

Fort  Worth,  Texas,  extension  of  com- 
mission government  to,  298. 

France,  broad  grants  of  power  given 
to  cities  in,  90;  methods  of  nomi- 
nating municipal  officers  in,  138 ; 
relation  of  state  to  municipal  par- 
ties in,  158 ;  no  salaries  given  mayors 
in  cities  of,  218. 

Franchises,  exclusive,  cannot  be  given 
without  statutory  authority,  89 ; 
rules  governing,  99-100 ;  powers  of 
city  councils  over  grants  of,  201- 
202. 

Franklin  Fund,  trustees  of,  appointed 
by  judges  of  Massachusetts  Su- 
preme Court,  247-248. 

French  Revolution,  echoes  of,  in  Amer- 
ica, 105. 

Fuld,  L.  F.,  Police  Administration,  14n. 

GAFFET,  F.  G.,  "Suffrage  Limitations 

at  the  South,"  114n. 
Galbreath,    C.   B.,    The  Initiative  and 

Referendum,  356. 
Galveston,     Texas,     establishment     of 

commission  government  in   (1901), 

22 ;    tidal  wave  in,  295 ;    adoption 

of     commission     government     by, 

296-297. 
Gas    plants,     municipal,     liability     of 

municipal    corporations    for    torts 

of  employees  in,  96. 


INDEX 


393 


Gaynor,  William  J.,  mayor  of  New 
York  City,  216. 

Georgia,  provisions  for  initiative  in 
constitution  of,  324. 

Germany,  methods  of  nominating  mu- 
nicipal officers  in,  138;  relation  of 
state  to  municipal  parties  in,  158; 
salaries  of  burgermeisters  in,  218; 
pensions  for  municipal  employees 
in  the  cities  of,  290. 

Gerrymander,  relation  of,  to  ward 
system;  191-192. 

Gilbertson,  H.  S.,  "Conservative  As- 
pects of  the  Recall,"  355n. 

Gloucester,  Massachusetts,  term  of 
commissioners  in,  302n. 

Godkin,  E.  L.,  Unforeseen  Tendencies 
of  Democracy,  322n,  357. 

Good  Government  Association,  of  Bos- 
ton, 370. 

Goodnow,  F.  J.,  Municipal  Govern- 
ment, 30n,  40n,  79,  206,  236,  263, 
293 ;  Comparative  Administrative 
Law,  76n;  Municipal  Home  Rule, 
79,  91n,  97n,  98n,  101;  Munici- 
pal Problems,  79,  124,  206,  263; 
Politics  and  Administration,  175n, 
179 ;  City  Government  in  the  United 
States,  183n,  255n;  "The  Neces- 
sity of  Distinguishing  Legislation 
from  Administration,"  206;  on 
the  professional  office-holder,  255 ; 
on  the  drift  away  from  the  board 
system  of  administration,  257  ff. 

Goodwin,  E.  H.,  "Draft  of  a  Civil 
Service  Law  for  Cities,"  293. 

Gould,  E.  R.  L.,  Local  Government  in 
Pennsylvania,  27. 

Governor,  in  colonies,  grant  of  borough 
charters  by,  3 ;  loses  power  to 
grant  charters  after  Revolution,  5. 

Grand  Junction,  Colorado,  use  of  pref- 
erential ballots  in,  148 ;  assignment 
of  functions  to  commissioners  in, 
303n. 

Greeks,  drift  of,  to  American  cities,  33. 

Greenlaw,  E.  A.,  "Office  of  Mayor  in 
the  United  States,"  236. 

Grosser,  H.  S.,  Chicago,  28. 

Guillou,  Jean,  L'emigration  des  cam- 
pagnes  vers  les  villes,  30n. 

Guthrie,  Oklahoma,  term  of  commis- 
sioners in,  302n. 

HALL,  P.  H.,  Immigration,  35n. 
Hamilton,    Alexander,    on    the    habits 

of  legislatures,  224-225. 
Hamilton,  J.  J.,   The  Dethronement  of 

the  City  Boss,  301n,  319. 


Hatton,  A.  R.,  Digest  of  City  Charters, 
72n,  79,  185n,  203n,  206,  215n,  236, 
263,  292. 

Haynes,  G.  H.,  "Educational  Quali- 
fications," 124n;  "The  People's 
Rule  in  Municipal  Affairs,"  330n. 

Hazard,  Ebenezer,  Historical  Collec- 
tions, 3n. 

Health  department,  liability  of  munici- 
pal corporations  for  torts  of  em- 
ployees in,  94. 

Hearings,  on  removals  of  officials,  287. 

Hening,  W.  W.,  Virginia  Statutes  at 
Large,  2n. 

History,  of  municipal  institutions  in 
the  United  States,  1-27;  of  cities, 
(1790-1825),  5-10;  of  American 
cities  (1825-1865),  10-15;  of  Amer- 
ican cities  (1865-1890),  15-21;  of 
American  cities  (1890-1912),  21-27. 

Hobson,  J.  A.,  The  Evolution  of  Modern 
Capitalism,  45n. 

Holcomb,  W.  P.,  Pennsylvania  Bor- 
oughs, 27. 

Hollander,  J.  H.,  The  Financial  History 
of  Baltimore,  28. 

Holyoke,  Massachusetts,  excess  of  female 
population  in,  30. 

Home-rule  charters,  provisions  for,  in 
state  constitutions,  64;  origin  of, 
in  Missouri,  61-62 ;  procedure  in 
obtaining,  62-63 ;  objections  to 
system  of,  63-66;  advantages  of 
system  of,  68-72;  burden  imposed 
upon  legislature,  68—69. 

Houston,  Texas,  property  qualification 
for  mayor  in,  215;  extension  of 
commission  government  to,  298. 

Howe,  Frederick  C.,  The  City,  the 
Hope  of  Democracy,  179,  333n. 

Howe,  W.  W.,  The  City  Government  of 
New  Orleans,  28. 

Hull,  R.  M.,  "Preferential  Voting  and 
How  it  Works,"  149n,  152. 

Huron,  South  Dakota,  use  of  recall  in, 
355. 

ILLINOIS,  legislature  of,  establishes 
state  police  control  in  Chicago 
(1861),  15,  211;  enacts  civil  ser- 
vice reform  law  (1895),  21 ;  pro- 
visions in  the  constitution  of,  relat- 
ing to  government  of  Chicago,  59- 
60;  Traction  Company,  extent 
of  its  operations,  66-67  ;  supervision 
of  local  civil  service  administra- 
tion in,  74 ;  merit  system  of  select- 
ing certain  city  employees  in, 
275. 


394 


INDEX 


Illiteracy,  in  cities  and  rural  districts, 
43-44;  as  a  bar  to  voting  rights, 
112-114;  figures  of,  in  United 
States,  119. 

Immigration,  from  rural  districts  to 
cities,  31 ;  foreign,  32-37. 

Indiana,  enacts  civil  service  reform 
law  (1895),  21 ;  admission  of  non- 
citizens  to  voting  rights  in,  107. 

Indianapolis,  City  Club  of,  375. 

Initiative  and  referendum.  See  Direct 
Legislation. 

Iowa,  first  use  of  non-partisan  pri- 
mary in,  131 ;  legislature  of,  author- 
izes adoption  of  commission  plan, 
298. 

Italians,  settlement  of,  in  American 
cities,  33. 

Ivins,  W.  M.,  Machine  Politics,  179. 

JACKSON,  ANDREW,  democratic  ten- 
dencies during  presidency  of,  11-12 ; 
rise  of  spoils  system  during  presi- 
dency of,  17 ;  attacks  congressional 
caucus,  126. 

Jelf,  E.  A.,  The  Corrupt  and  Illegal 
Practices  Prevention  Acts  of  1883 
and  1895,  152. 

Jersey  City,  length  of  mayor's  term  in, 
214. 

Johnson,  L.  J.,  "Direct  Legislation," 
336n. 

Jones,  C.  L.,  Readings  on  Parties  and 
Elections,  131n,  139n,  152. 

Jones,  D.  A.,  The  Negligence  of  Munici- 
pal Corporations,  96n,  101. 

Jones,  T.  J.,  The  Sociology  of  a  New 
York  City  Block,  52. 

KANSAS,   admission  of  non-citizens  to 

voting  rights  in,  107. 
Kansas  City,   civil  service  system  in, 

242n,  276. 
Kingsley,  Charles,  "Great  Cities,  and 

their  Influence  for  Good  and  Evil," 

46n. 

LEAGUE    of    American    Municipalities, 

aims  and  work  of,  363. 
Lecky,    W.    E.    H.,    Democracy    and 

Liberty,  124,  356. 
Legislative  control  of  city  affairs,  71- 

74. 
Legislature,    assumes    charter-granting 

functions  after  the  Revolution,  5 ; 

increased    interference    of,    in    city 

affairs,    14;     state   checks    on    the 

supremacy    of,    in      dealing      with 

cities,  53-55. 


Levasseur,  Emiln,  La  population  fran- 
faise,  52. 

Liability  of  municipal  corporations. 
See  Contracts,  Property,  Torts. 

Lighting,  street,  first  establishment  of, 
10. 

Limitations,  constitutional,  on  state 
legislature  in  relation  to  city  affairs, 
53  ff. 

Lithuanians,  drift  of,  to  cities,  33. 

Loans,  municipal,  special  elections  to 
authorize,  106;  powers  of  city 
councils  in  the  matter  of,  201. 

Lobingier,  C.  S.,  The  People's  Law,  356. 

Local  Government  Board,  in  England, 
74. 

Local  option,  frequent  use  of  referen- 
dum in,  325-326;  use  of  direct 
legislation  in,  348. 

London,  death  rate  in,  during  Middle 
Ages,  38 ;  relation  of  state  to  mu- 
nicipal parties  in,  158-159. 

Los  Angeles,  California,  phenomenal 
growth  in  population  of,  since  1900, 
26 ;  merit  system  in,  276 ;  adoption 
of  recall  by,  350;  City  Club  of, 
375. 

Louisiana,  enacts  civil  service  reform 
law  (1896),  21 ;  exclusion  of  negroes 
from  suffrage  in,  113. 

Lowell,  A.  L.,  The  Government  of  Eng- 
land, 152,  159n ;  on  qualifications 
of  department  heads,  243 ;  Govern- 
ments and  Parties  in  Continental 
Europe,  357. 

Lowell,  F.  C.,  "The  American  Boss," 
175n. 

Lowell,  Massachusetts,  excess  of  female 
population  in,  30. 

Ludington,  Arthur,  "Ballot  Laws  in 
the  United  States,"  143n,  152. 

Luetscher,  G.  D.,  Early  Political  Ma- 
chinery in  the  United  States,  126n, 
151. 

Lynn,  Massachusetts,  assignment  of 
functions  to  commissioners  in,  303n. 

McCALL,  S.  W.,  "  Representative  as 
against  Direct  Government,"  339». 

McCrary,  G.  W.,  Treatise  on  the  Ameri- 
can Law  of  Elections,  112n,  152. 

MacGregor,  F.  H.,  City  Government  by 
Commission,  319. 

McMillan,  D.  C.,  The  Elective  Franchise 
in  the  United  States,  124. 

McQuillin,  Eugene,  The  Law  of  Mu- 
nicipal Corporations,  64w,  79,  80n, 
84n,  85n,  86n,  87n,  101,  195n, 
264. 


INDEX 


395 


Macy,  Jesse,  Party  Organization  and 
Machinery,  166n,  179. 

Macy,  John  E.,  Selection  of  Cases  on 
Municipal  or  Public  Corporations, 
88n,  101. 

Maine,  educational  testa  for  suffrage 
in,  112  ;  provisions  for  direct  legisla- 
tion in  constitution  of,  327ra. 

Maine,  Sir  Henry  S.,  Popular  Govern- 
ment, 124. 

Maltbie,  M.  R.,  "City-made  Char- 
ters," 62n,  79  ;  "  Municipal  Politi- 
cal Parties,"  156n,  161n. 

Manchester,  New  Hampshire,  excess 
of  female  population  in,  30. 

Markets,  municipal,  liability  of  munici- 
pal corporations  for  torts  of  em- 
ployees in,  96. 

Marriage  rate,  in  urban  and  rural  com- 
munities, 38. 

Maryland,  legislature  of,  establishes 
state  police  control  in  Baltimore 
(1860),  14-15,  211 ;  appointment  of 
Baltimore  police  board  by  legisla- 
ture of,  247 ;  early  use  of  ordinary 
referendum  in,  324. 

Massachusetts,  assumes  state  control 
of  Boston  police  (1885),  19;  enacts 
civil  service  reform  law  (1884), 
21 ;  special  legislation  for  cities  in, 
61 ;  restrictions  on  municipal  bor- 
rowing powers  in,  66 ;  applica- 
tions for  new  charters  by  cities  of, 
67 ;  failure  to  enforce  rules  relating 
to  municipal  finance  in,  73 ;  state 
control  of  local  civil  service  in, 
74 ;  metropolitan  commissions  in, 
75 ;  abolition  of  property  qualifi- 
cations for  voting  in,  105 ;  special 
suffrage  at  school  elections  in,  106; 
residence  requirements  for  voting 
in  cities  of,  111 ;  voters  required 
to  read  and  write  in  cities  of,  112; 
voters  required  to  be  assessed  for 
poll-taxes  in,  114;  registration  of 
voters  in,  116;  names  of  voters 
kept  on  rolls  int  1 18 ;  system  of 
joint  primaries  in,  130 ;  simplifica- 
tion of  ballot  in,  144;  use  of  joint 
primary  in,  194;  appointment 
of  Boston  police  commissioner 
by  governor  of,  247 ;  appointment 
of  Franklin  Fund  trustees  by  su- 
preme court  of,  247-248;  merit 
system  of  selecting  municipal  offi- 
cers in,  275,  278-279;  administra- 
tion of  merit  system  in,  278-280; 
right  to  instruct  representatives 
provided  for  in  constitution  of,  324. 


Massachusetts  Civic  League,  aims  and 
methods  of,  361. 

Matthews,  Nathan,  The  City  Govern- 
ment of  Boston,  lOn,  28,  210n. 

Mayor,  position  of,  in  colonial  boroughs, 
4,  181 ;  after  the  Revolution,  6 ; 
increased  powers  of,  in  New  York 
City  by  charter  of  1830,  10 ;  popu- 
lar election  of,  11 ;  increase  in 
appointing  power  of,  14;  position 
of,  in  Municipal  Program,  21n; 
power  of,  to  accept  or  reject  state 
legislation  in  New  York,  59 ;  powers 
of,  in  colonial  boroughs,  181 ;  pre- 
sides at  council  meetings  in  Chi- 
cago and  Providence,  195 ;  office 
of,  in  American  cities,  207-236; 
early  powers  of,  208;  increase  of 
powers  of,  during  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, 209 ;  increase  in  powers  of, 
after  1850,  210-211;  method  of 
electing,  213-214;  term  of,  in 
varous  cities,  213—214 ;  qualifica- 
tions for  office  of,  215—216;  office 
of,  as  a  stepping-stone,  216-217; 
salary  of,  217-218;  demand  on 
private  purse  of,  219-220;  powers 
of,  221-235;  veto  power  of,  223- 
226;  appointing  powers  of,  226- 
232;  power  to  frame  budget,  232- 
234 ;  appointment  of  administra- 
tive boards  by,  240 ;  power  of,  to 
remove  department  heads,  248— 
249 ;  appointment  of  civil  service 
authorities  by,  277-278;  tradition 
attaching  to  the  office  of,  317 ;  at- 
tempted recall  of,  in  Boston,  351n. 

Mayo-Smith,  R.,  Emigration  and  Immi- 
gration, 35n. 

Memphis,  merit  system  in,  276 ;  earliest 
experiments  with  commission  gov- 
ernment in,  298;  percentage  of 
signatures  required  for  initiative 
petitions  in,  328n. 

Merit  system,  origin  of,  275;  aims  of, 
276;  administration  of,  in  differ- 
ent cities,  277-279 ;  results  of,  279- 
280;  objections  to,  280-285;  pre- 
vention of  unfair  dismissals  under, 
286-287 ;  beneficial  achievements  of, 
287-289 ;  inadequate  provision  for, 
in  commission  charters,  306n. 
See  also  Appointments,  Removals. 

Merriam,  C.  E.,  Primary  Elections, 
128n,  129n,  151. 

Meuriot,  Paul,  Des  agglomerations  ur- 
baines  dans  VEurope  contemporaine, 
3  In,  52. 

Meyer,  E.  C.,  Nominating  Systems,  151. 


396 


INDEX 


Michigan,  abolishes  state  police  con- 
trol, 19;  provisions  in  the  new 
constitution  of,  concerning  special 
legislation  for  cities,  60;  free- 
holders' charter  system  in,  63 ; 
alien  voters  in,  107 ;  residence  re- 
quirement for  voting  in  cities  of, 
111. 

Militia,  power  of  mayor  to  call  out, 
234. 

Milk  inspection,  relation  of,  to  urban 
death  rates,  40. 

Mill,  John  Stuart,  on  the  "magic  of 
property,"  48;  Representative  Gov- 
ernment,  124,  357. 

Miller,  G.  A.,  "The  Home  Rule  Law  for 
Michigan  Cities,"  79. 

Milwaukee,  City  Club  of,  376. 

Mining  industry  as  a  counteracting 
influence  upon  the  urban  influx, 
34. 

Minnesota,  home-rule  charter  system 
in,  62. 

Mississippi,  exclusion  of  negroes  from 
suffrage  in,  113. 

Missouri,  admission  of  non-citizens  to 
voting  rights  in,  107 ;  appointment 
of  St.  Louis  police  commissioners 
by  governor  of,  247 ;  relation  of 
initiative  to  home-rule  charter  sys- 
tem in,  326 ;  provisions  for  direct 
legislation  in  constitution  of,  327n. 

Montana,  provisions  for  direct  legis- 
lation in  constitution  of,  327n. 

Montesquieu,  influence  of,  225;  on 
the  checks  to  power,  317. 

Moral  standards,  of  urban  and  rural 
areas,  45-46. 

Mortality  at  various  ages  in  cities, 
31-32;  among  infants  in  large 
cities,  39-40. 

Moses,  Bernard,  The  Establishment  of 
City  Government  in  San  Francisco, 
28. 

Municipal  Voters'  League,  of  Chicago, 
367-369. 

Munro,  W.  B.,  The  Government  of 
European  Cities,  103n,  159n,  180n, 
197n,  237n;  The  Initiative,  Referen- 
dum and  Recall,  '33  In,  336n,  355n, 
356. 

Myers,  G.,  The  History  of  Tammany 
Hall,  163n,  179. 

NATIONAL  Civil  Service  Reform  League, 

aims  and  work  of,  362. 
National   Municipal   League,   issues   a 

Municipal    Program    (1899),    21n; 

its  aims  and  work,  360-361. 


Naturalization,  of  aliens,  prime  interest 
of  cities  in,  37  ;  rules  of  law  relating 
to,  106-109 ;  fraudulent  practices 
in,  109-111. 

Nebraska,  admission  of  citizens  to  non- 
voting  rights  in,  107. 

Negroes,  admission  of,  to  citizenship, 
107 ;  methods  of  excluding  from 
suffrage  in  southern  cities,  113- 
114. 

New  Bedford,  Massachusetts,  excess 
of  female  population  in,  30. 

New  England,  absence  of  chartered 
boroughs  in,  3 ;  one-year  mayoral 
term  commissioner  in  cities  of,  213. 

New  Hampshire,  percentage  of  illit- 
eracy in  cities  of,  1 19 ;  constitu- 
tional provision  concerning  right 
of  people  to  instruct  negroes  in, 
324. 

New  Haven,  merit  system  in,  276. 

New  Jersey,  abolition  of  property 
qualification  for  voting  in,  105. 

New  Orleans,  age  qualification  of 
mayor  in,  215. 

New  York  City,  population  of,  in  1790, 
9 ;  police  system  of,  in  1825,  9-10 ; 
charter  of  (1825),  10;  charter  of 
(1849),  13;  provision  for  adminis- 
trative officials  in  charter  of  (1830), 
13 ;  change  in  methods  of  selecting 
administrative  officers  made  in 
1857,  14 ;  state  police  control  es- 
tablished in  (1857),  14;  govern- 
ment of,  in  years  following  the 
War,  15 ;  provisions  against  pat- 
ronage in  charter  of  (1873),  17; 
political  tendencies  of  foreign-born 
voters  in,  36-37;  special  legis- 
lation relating  to,  61 ;  naturaliza- 
tion of  aliens  by  the  courts  of,  110; 
registration  of  voters  in,  117;  work 
of  Citizens'  Union  in,  159—160 ; 
party  organization  in,  162-163 ; 
adoption  of  single-chambered  coun- 
cil in,  185;  number  of  members  in 
city  council  of,  188;  salaries  of 
aldermen  in,  190 ;  work  of  Board 
of  Estimate  and  Apportionment  in, 
200;  limitations  on  appropriating 
powers  of  city  council  in,  201 ;  early 
powers  of  mayor  in,  208;  popular 
election  of  mayor  introduced  in 
1834,  210;  state  police  provided 
for,  211 ;  comparative  influence 
of  mayor  and  city  council  in,  212 ; 
mayor's  term  lengthened  to  four 
years  in,  213 ;  salary  of  mayor  in, 
218 ;  appointing  powers  of  mayor  in, 


INDEX 


397 


229-230 ;  method  of  making  appro- 
priations in,  233  ;  election  of  comp- 
troller in,  245n ;  scope  of  mayor's 
appointing  power  in,  246;  provis- 
ions concerning  removals  in  present 
charter  of,  250 ;  number  of  admin- 
istrative departments  in,  250-251 ; 
number  of  civic  employees  in,  266 ; 
cost  of  official  incapacity  in,  274 ; 
political  assessments  in,  288 ;  certi- 
fication of  pay-rolls  by  civil  service 
commission  in,  289 ;  Citizens'  Union 
in,  365-366 ;  City  Club  of,  375. 

New  York,  legislature  of,  establishes 
state  police  board  for  New  York 
City  (1857),  14;  abolishes  state 
police  control  (1870),  19 ;  enacts 
civil  service  reform  law  (1883), 
21 ;  classification  of  cities  in,  58— 
59 ;  special  legislation  for  cities  in, 
61 ;  restrictions  on  municipal  bor- 
rowing powers  in,  66 ;  public  utili- 
ties commissions  in,  74 ;  supervision 
of  local  civil  service  systems  in, 
74;  abolition  of  property  qualifi- 
cations for  voting  in,  105 ;  special 
provision  for  convicted  voters  in, 
115;  percentage  of  illiteracy  in 
cities  of,  119;  regulation  of  party 
caucuses  in,  128;  provides  state 
police  for  New  York  City,  211; 
merit  system  of  selecting  municipal 
officials  in,  275,  277-278;  appoint- 
ment of  civil  service  commissioners 
in  cities  of,  by  mayors,  277-278; 
Municipal  Government  Association 
of,  361. 

Nomination  by  petition,  in  Boston,  23. 

Nominations,  municipal,  early  stages 
in  history  of,  125-126 ;  abuses  in, 
127-128;  by  party  primaries,  128- 
130 ;  by  open  primaries,  131-132 ; 
objections  to  the  primary,  132-136 ; 
by  petition,  137-138 ;  of  city  coun- 
cillors, 194. 

Norfolk,  first  charter  of  (1736),  2;  as 
an  example  of  a  close  corporation,  4. 

North  Carolina,  exclusion  of  negroes 
from  suffrage  in,  113. 

OBEHHOLTZEK,  E.  P.,  "The  Progress 
of  Home  Rule  in  Cities,"  79 ; 
The  Referendum,  Initiative,  and  Re- 
call in  America,  321n,  323n,  326n, 
33  In,  348n,  355n,  356. 

Ohio,  assumes  state  control  of  Cin- 
cinnati police  (1886),  19;  provisions 
in  the  constitution  of,  relating  to 
city  charters,  55;  home-rule  pro- 


visions adopted  by  constitutional 
convention  in,  58 ;  amount  of 
time  given  by  legislature  of,  to 
city  affairs,  68 ;  merit  system  of 
selecting  certain  city  officials  in, 
275 ;  Municipal  Association  of,  its 
aims  and  methods,  361. 

Oklahoma,  home-rule  charter  system 
in,  63 ;  provisions  for  direct  legis- 
lation in  the  constitution  of,  327n. 

Ordinances,  definition  of,  85;  formali- 
ties to  be  observed  in  the  enact- 
ment of,  86;  must  be  reasonable, 
86—87 ;  must  not  make  improper 
discriminations,  87-88 ;  must  not 
unduly  restrain  trade,  88-89 ;  lia- 
bility of  municipal  corporations 
for  non-enforcement  of,  92—93 ; 
powers  of  city  councils  in  enact- 
ment of,  199-200;  multiplicity  of, 
in  larger  cities,  203 ;  veto  of,  by 
mayors,  223-225;  making  of,  by 
the  machinery  of  direct  legislation, 
329. 

Oregon,  admission  of  non-citizens  to 
voting  rights  in,  107 ;  establish- 
ment of  direct  legislation  in,  327n. 

Orth,  S.  P.,  The  Centralization  of 
Administration  in  Ohio,  75n. 

Ostrogorski,  M.,  "The  Rise  and  Fall 
of  the  Nominating  Caucus,"  126n; 
Democracy  and  the  Party  System, 
127»,  175n. 

Owen,  R.  L.,  The  Code  of  the  People's 
Law,  356. 

PARDON,  mayor's  power  of,  in  police 
court  cases,  234. 

Paris,  France,  distribution  of  popula- 
tion in,  according  to  age,  3  In. 

Parks,  department  of,  liability  of  the 
city  for  the  torts  of  employees  in 
the,  94. 

Parties,  effect  of  identity  of  state  and 
municipal  election  days  on,  139— 
140;  need  of  municipal,  153-154; 
relation  of  municipal  to  state,  154— 
155;  methods  of  divorcing  state 
and  municipal,  155-161 ;  obstacles 
in  the  way  of  strictly  municipal, 
156-158 ;  experience  of  New  York 
City  in  the  matter  of  independent, 
159-161 ;  organization  of,  in  large 
cities,  162-164;  in  Philadelphia, 
164-165;  in  Boston,  165-166;  in 
other  cities  of  the  United  States, 
166-167;  their  work,  167-168; 
raising  of  funds  for,  169-171 ;  ex- 
penditures of,  171-172 ;  control  of 


398 


INDEX 


patronage  by  leaders  of,  171-174; 
place  of  the  boss  in  the  organization 
of,  174-178.  See  also  Reform, 
Municipal. 

Patronage,  nature  of,  in  large  cities, 
172-173;  its  vicious  results,  173- 
174 ;  its  use  by  municipal  bosses, 
174-178 ;  interest  of  councilmen 
in,  205.  See  also  Merit  System. 

Pennsylvania,  special  legislation  for 
cities  in,  61 ;  residence  require- 
ments for  voting  in,  111;  voters 
required  to  have  paid  state  taxes  in, 
114;  names  of  voters  kept  on  lists 
from  year  to  year  in,  118;  merit 
system  of  selecting  certain  city 
officials  in,  275-277 ;  right  of  people 
to  instruct  their  representatives 
provided  for  in  constitution  of, 
324. 

Pensions,  for  municipal  employees, 
290-292. 

Petition,  the  system  of  nomination  by, 
136-138 ;  nomination  of  councilmen 
by,  in  Boston,  194. 

Phelps,  P.  M.,  Selected  Articles  on  the 
Initiative  and  Referendum,  356. 

Philadelphia,  first  charter  of  (1691),  2; 
importance  of,  in  later  colonial 
era,  4;  new  charter  of  (1789),  5-6; 
special  legislation  relating  to,  6 ; 
population  of,  in  1790,  9 ;  changes 
made  by  charter  of  1854  in,  13; 
foreign-born  element  in  the  popu- 
lation of,  35 ;  registration  of  voters 
in,  117;  framework  of  party  or- 
ganization in,  164-165 ;  retention 
of  bicameral  council  in,  185 ;  Select 
Council  of,  188;  non-payment  of 
councilmen  in,  190 ;  retention  of 
ward  system  in,  191 ;  adopted  popu- 
lar election  of  mayor  in  1826,  210 ; 
relative  powers  of  mayor  and 
municipal  legislature  in,  212 ;  length 
of  mayor's  term  of  office  in,  213 ; 
qualifications  of  candidates  for 
mayoralty  in,  215 ;  mayor's  salary 
in,  218;  executive  veto  in,  223; 
popular  election  of  certain  adminis- 
trative officials  in,  245n;  appoint- 
ment of  school  authorities  by  judges 
in,  247 ;  number  of  administrative 
departments  in,  251 ;  appointment 
of  civil  service  commissioners  in, 
277 ;  unwieldy  nature  of  city  coun- 
cil in,  314;  experience  with  refer- 
enda on  municipal  borrowing  in, 
348n;  City  Club  of,  375;  Bureau 
of  Municipal  Research  in,  376. 


Phillips,  J.  B.,  Educational  Qualifications 
of  Voters,  114n,  124. 

Physique,  effects  of  urban  concentra- 
tion on  racial,  41-43. 

Pittsburgh,  administrative  changes  in, 
during  early  seventies,  16;  retains 
bicameral  council,  185. 

Poles,  influx  of,  to  larger  American 
cities,  33. 

Police,  organization  of,  in  New  York 
City,  during  earlier  part  of  nine- 
teenth century,  9-10;  state  con- 
trol of,  established  in  New  York, 
Baltimore,  St.  Louis,  and  Chicago, 
15;  abolished  in  New  York  and 
Chicago,  19 ;  liability  of  the  city  for 
the  torts  of,  94-95 ;  intrusted  with 
work  of  listing  voters  in  Boston,  116. 

Pond,  O.  L.,  Municipal  Control  of 
Public  Utilities,  89n,  lOOn,  101, 
201n. 

Pontiac,  Michigan,  use  of  direct  legis- 
lation procedure  in,  329n. 

Poor  relief,  liability  of  municipal  cor- 
porations for  the  torts  of  adminis- 
trative officials  in  the  department 
of,  94. 

Population,  of  colonial  boroughs,  4 ; 
of  American  cities  in  1790,  9 ;  in- 
crease of  cities  in,  during  period 
1865-1890,  18;  increase  of,  in  cities 
since  1890,  25-26 ;  causes  of  rapid 
growth  of,  in  urban  centres,  26-27 ; 
of  typical  urban  and  rural  units 
compared,  29 ;  distribution  of, 
according  to  sex,  29-30;  distribu- 
tion of,  according  to  age,  30-32 ; 
distribution  of,  according  to  race 
and  nativity,  32-37 ;  normal  growth 
of,  in  urban  and  rural  areas,  37-41 ; 
physical  development  of,  in  town 
and  country,  41-43 ;  ratio  of  illit- 
erates in  urban  and  rural  elements 
of,  43-44 ;  moral  standards  of 
different  elements  in  the,  45-46; 
ownership  of  property  by  city  and 
country,  47-48. 

Populists,  early  advocacy  of  the  recall 
by,  350. 

Portland,  Oregon,  use  of  direct  legis- 
lation methods  in,  329 ;  Taxpayers' 
League  of,  its  part  at  referenda, 
337n. 

Pratt,  E.  E.,  Industrial  Causes  of  the 
Congestion  of  Population  in  New 
York  City,  52. 

Prefect,  office  of,  in  France,  74 ;  powers 
of,  in  Paris,  compared  with  powers 
of  American  mayor,  235. 


INDEX 


399 


Preferential  voting,  147-149.  See  also 
Ballot. 

Primary,  spread  of  the  non-partisan, 
in  American  cities,  23 ;  different 
types  of,  now  in  use,  129-132;  ob- 
jections to  the,  as  a  method  of 
nominating  municipal  officers,  133— 
136.  See  also  Nomination. 

Progressives,  in  London,  158—159. 

Property,  ownership  of,  by  urban  and 
rural  voters,  47-48 ;  municipal 
liabilities  connected  with  the  hold- 
ing of,  98-99 ;  ownership  of,  as  a 
qualification  for  voting,  105;  by 
municipal  voters  in  Rhode  Island, 
114. 

Providence,  Rhode  Island,  place  of 
the  mayor  with  reference  to  the 
city  council  in,  195. 

Prussia,  broad  grants  of  power  given 
to  cities  in,  90. 

Pryor,  J.  L.,  "Should  Municipal  Legis- 
lators receive  a  Salary?",  190n, 
206. 

Public  service  corporations,  relation 
of  the  city  to,  99-100;  contribu- 
tions made  by,  to  party  funds,  170. 
See  also  Franchises. 

Public  utilities,  relation  of  the  council 
to,  201-202. 

Public  works,  departments  of,  faulty 
organization  of,  in  many  cities, 
260-261. 

QUALIFICATIONS,  of  councilmen  and 
aldermen,  188-190;  of  candidates 
for  the  mayoralty,  215 ;  of  depart- 
ment heads,  243-244.  See  also 
Merit  System. 

Quincy,  Josiah,  second  mayor  of  Bos- 
ton, 210;  Municipal  History  of 
Boston,  Bn,  28. 

RAWLES,  W.  A.,  Centralizing  Tendencies 
in  the  Administration  of  Indiana, 
75n. 

Recall,  spread  of  the,  in  cities,  23 ;  in 
Des  Moines,  300;  origin  of,  350; 
machinery  of  the,  351-352 ;  argu- 
ments for  the  use  of,  352—354 ;  argu- 
ments against  the  use  of,  355-356. 

Recorder,  office  of,  in  colonial  boroughs, 
4. 

Reform,  municipal,  progress  of,  before 
1890,  20;  progress  of,  since  1890, 
25 ;  definition  of,  358 ;  types  of 
organizations  working  for,  360- 
377 ;  difficulties  encountered  by 
movements  for,  377-383. 


Reformers,  in  London,  158-159. 

Registration,  of  voters,  in  various 
cities,  115-119. 

Removals,  of  city  officials,  aldermanic 
concurrence  in,  229 ;  of  department 
heads,  248-250.  See  also  Merit 
System. 

Residence,  as  a  requirement  for  nat- 
uralization, 108;  as  a  require- 
ment for  the  suffrage,  111-112. 

Revolution,  effects  of  the,  on  city 
charters,  5-6 ;  on  the  organization 
and  functions  of  city  councils, 
181-182 ;  on  the  office  of  mayor, 
208.  See  also  Federal  Analogy. 

Rhode  Island,  property  qualification 
for  voting  at  city  council  elections 
in,  114. 

Richmond,  Virginia,  first  charter  of 
(1742),  2. 

Ridgely,  David,  Annals  of  Annapolis, 
2n. 

Ringwalt,  R.  C.,  Briefs  on  Public 
Questions,  124. 

Robbins,  E.  C.,  Selected  Articles  on 
Commission  Government,  319. 

Robinson,  C.  M.,  The  Call  of  the  City, 
32n. 

Rogers,  H.  W.,  "Municipal  Corpora- 
tions," 3ra,  28. 

Roosevelt,  Theodore,  New  York,  28 ; 
Practical  Politics,  179 ;  unsuccessful 
candidate  for  mayoralty  of  New 
York  City,  217. 

Rose,  J.  C.,  "Negro  Suffrage,"  114n. 

Rotation  in  office,  principle  of,  its 
working  in  city  administration,  12. 

Rowe,  L.  S.,  Problems  of  City  Govern- 
ment, 101. 

SALABIES,  of  aldermen  and  councillors, 
190;  of  department  heads,  259- 
260. 

San  Bernardino,  California,  use  of  the 
recall  in,  355n. 

San  Francisco,  state  and  municipal 
elections  held  on  different  days  in, 
141  ;  maintains  single  chamber 
system,  185 ;  number  of  members 
in  city  council  of,  188 ;  abolition 
of  ward  system  in,  191 ;  qualifica- 
tions for  the  office  of  mayor  in, 
215 ;  executive  veto  in,  223  ;  scope 
of  mayor's  appointing  power  in, 
246;  rise  of  merit  system  in,  276. 

Scandinavians,  migration  of,  to  rural 
districts,  33. 

Scharf,  J.  T.,  History  of  St.  Louis,  28. 

Schenectady,  New  York,  rapid  growth 


400 


INDEX 


of  population  in,  during  last  decade, 
26. 

Schools,  use  of,  as  polling  places,  141 ; 
advantages  of  the  board  system 
in  the  administration  of,  256—257. 

Schurz,  Carl,  on  the  importance  of 
personnel  in  city  government,  378. 

Scroggs,  W.  O.,  "Commission  Govern- 
ment in  the  South,"  296n. 

Seattle,  rapid  increase  in  population  of, 
since  1900,  26;  extension  of  merit 
system  in,  276;  use  of  recall  in, 
355n. 

Separation  of  powers,  the  principle 
of,  introduced  after  the  Revolution, 
7 ;  its  vicious  effects  upon  the  or- 
ganization of  local  government, 
8 ;  its  application  to  the  authority 
of  city  councils,  205;  disregarded 
in  the  commission  plan  of  city 
government,  294;  its  merits  and 
defects  as  a  working  principle,  315. 

Sewer  department,  liability  of  the 
municipal  corporation  for  the  torts 
of  employees  in,  96. 

Sexes,  distribution  of  national  popula- 
tion according  to,  29-30. 

Shambaugh,  B.  F.,  Commission  Gov- 
ernment in  Iowa,  301n. 

Shaw,  Albert,  Local  Government  in 
Illinois,  27. 

Short  ballot,  need  for  and  merits  of, 
145-147.  See  also  Ballot. 

Short  Ballot  Organization,  aims  and 
work  of  the,  362. 

Sioussat,  St.  G.  L.,  Baltimore,  28. 

Sites,  C.  M.  L.,  Centralized  Adminis- 
tration of  the  Liquor  Laws  in  Ameri- 
can Commonwealths,  75n. 

Slavs,  influx  of,  to  American  cities,  33. 

Snavely,  C.,  History  of  the  City  Gov- 
ernment of  Cleveland,  13n,  28. 

South  Carolina,  exclusion  of  negroes 
from  suffrage  in  the  cities  of,  113. 

South  Dakota,  admission  of  non-citi- 
zens to  voting  rights  in,  107. 

South  Park  Commissioners,  in  Chicago, 
appointed  by  judges  of  Cook 
County,  247. 

Sparling,  S.  E.,  Municipal  History  and 
Present  Organization  of  the  City  of 
Chicago,  28. 

Spencer,  D.  E.,  Local  Government  in 
Wisconsin,  27. 

Spoils  system,  genesis  of  the,  12 ;  early 
attacks  on,  17 ;  relation  of,  to  re- 
movals from  office,  249-250.  See 
also  Merit  System. 

Spokane,  Washington,  rapid  growth  in 


population  of,  during  last  decade, 
26 ;  use  of  system  of  preferential 
voting  in,  148. 

Sprague,  H.  H.,  The  City  Government 
of  Boston,  its  Rise  and  Development, 
28. 

Staunton,  Virginia,  administrative  ex- 
periments in,  317n. 

Steffens,  Lincoln,  The  Struggle  for  Self- 
Government,  179. 

Stephenson,  G.  T.,  Race  Distinctions 
in  American  Law,  113n. 

Stimson,  F.  J.,  Federal  and  State  Con- 
stitutions of  the  United  States,  325n. 

St.  Louis,  state  control  of  municipal 
police  established  in  (1861),  15; 
administrative  changes  in,  during 
early  seventies,  16-17 ;  strength 
of  the  foreign-born  element  in  the 
population  of,  33 ;  present  police 
commission  in,  75 ;  retains  bicameral 
council,  185 ;  House  of  Delegates 
in,  188 ;  length  of  mayor's  term  in, 
213 ;  popular  election  of  various 
administrative  officials  in,  245n ; 
present  relations  of  state  to  city  in, 
236-247 ;  number  of  administra- 
tive departments  in,  251 ;  civic 
betterment  organizations  of,  364 ; 
Civic  League  of,  370;  City  Club 
of,  375. 

Streets,  liability  of  municipal  corpora- 
tions for  the  torts  of  employees  in 
the  department  of,  96-97. 

Strong,  Josiah,  The  Twentieth  Century 
City,  45n. 

Suffrage.     See  Electorate. 

Sumner,  Charles,  begins  fight  against 
spoils  system,  17. 

Switzerland,  use  of  direct  legislation 
in,  103,  324. 

TACOMA,  Washington,  use  of  the  recall 
in,  355. 

Taxation,  relation  of,  to  legal  residence, 
111-112;  relation  of,  to  voting 
rights,  114-115;  evasion  of,  by 
those  assessed  for  poll-taxes  only, 
121;  powers  of  city  councils  with 
reference  to,  200. 

Tennessee,  payment  of  poll-taxes  a  pre- 
requisite for  voting  in,  114. 

Terms  of  office,  for  heads  of  depart- 
ments, 257-258 ;  for  commissioners, 
302-303.  See  also  Appointments, 
Removals,  Merit  System. 

Texas,  admission  of  non-citizens  to 
voting  rights  in,  107 ;  legislature 
of,  provides  commission  plan  of 


INDEX 


401 


government  for  Galveston,  296- 
297. 

Thayer,  J.  B.,  Cases  on  Constitutional 
Law,  88. 

Thompson,  S.  D.,  Cases  on  Municipal 
Negligence,  98. 

Tocqueville,  Alexis  de,  views  of,  on 
suffrage  extensions,  12 ;  Democracy 
in  America,  11,  124;  on  the  im- 
portance of  the  personnel  in  admin- 
istration, 308. 

Tolman,  W.  H.,  Municipal  Reform 
Movement  in  the  United  States, 
385. 

Torts,  liability  of  the  municipal  cor- 
poration for,  91-99. 

Treasurer,  office  of,  in  colonial  boroughs, 
4 ;  post  of,  made  elective  in  Phila- 
delphia (1854),  13. 

Trenton,  New  Jersey,  first  charter  of 
(1746),  2. 

Tweed,  W.  M.,  Tammany  boss  of  New 
York  City,  his  dependence  upon 
the  illiterate  element  of  the  voters, 
120. 

Tweed  Ring,  in  New  York  City,  its 
operations,  15-16. 

Tyson,  Robert,  "Preferential  Voting," 
149. 

UTAH,  provisions  for  direct  legislation 
in  constitution  of,  327n. 

VETO,  mayoral,  its  appearance  after 
the  Revolution,  8-9;  first  appear- 
ance of,  in  municipal  charters, 
208-209;  mayoral,  procedure  in, 
223-226.  See  also  Mayor. 

Voters.     See  Electorate. 

Voters'  lists.  See  Registration  of 
Voters. 

Voting,  qualifications  for,  in  American 
cities,  102-124. 

WANAMAKER,  JOHN,  Speeches  on  Quay- 
ism  and  Boss  Domination  in  Phila- 
delphia Politics,  179. 

Wards,  system  of  election  by,  190-191 ; 
its  merits  and  defects,  191-194. 

Wash  houses,  municipal,  liability  of 
municipal  corporations  for  torts  of 
employees  in,  96. 


Washington,  educational  tests  for  vot- 
ing in,  112. 

Water  supply,  of  New  York  City,  be- 
fore 1842,  10. 

Weber,  A.  F.,  The  Growth  of  Cities  in 
the  Nineteenth  Century,  9n,  27, 
35n,  50n,  52. 

West  Virginia,  report  of  commission 
in,  concerning  special  charter  laws, 
68. 

Whinery,  Samuel,  Municipal  Public 
Works,  244n,  263,  273n,  293;  on 
qualifications  of  department  heads, 
244 ;  on  methods  of  dealing  with 
municipal  contractors,  273n. 

Whitten,  R.  H.,  Public  Administra- 
tion in  Massachusetts,  75n. 

Wigmore,  J.  H.,  The  Australian  Ballot 
System,  143n,  152. 

Wilcox,  D.  F.,  Municipal  Franchises, 
101 ;  The  American  City,  124,  206, 
236 ;  The  Government  of  Great  Ameri- 
can Cities,  264. 

Williams,  H.  W.,  "The  Reform  of  our 
Municipal  Councils,"  206. 

Wilson,  J.  G.,  Memorial  History  of  the 
City  of  New  York,  28. 

Wilson,  Woodrow,  "The  Issues  of 
Reform,"  331. 

Wisconsin,  enacts  civil  service  reform 
law,  21 ;  public  utilities  commission 
in,  74;  alien  voters  in,  107n;  use 
of  open  primary  in,  131 ;  merit 
system  of  selecting  certain  city 
employees  in,  275. 

Women  in  industry,  effect  of,  on  urban 
death  rates,  40. 

Women's  suffrage,  123. 

Woodburn,  J.  A.,  Political  Parties  and 
Party  Problems,  179. 

Woodruff,  C.  R.,  City  Government  by 
Commission,  297w,  299n,  319. 

Woolston,  H.  B.,  A  Study  of  the  Popu- 
lation of  Manhattanville,  52. 

Wyoming,  educational  tests  for  voting 
in,  112. 

ZUKBLIN,  CHARLES,  American  Munici- 
pal Progress,  24n;  A  Decade  of 
Civic  Improvement,  24n. 


''T^HE    following    pages    contain    advertisements    of 
books  by  the  same  author  or  on  kindred  subjects. 


BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 

The  Government  of  European  Cities 

Cloth,  8vo,  $2.00  net;  by  mail,  £2.79 

"  The  most  effective  work  now  done  in  political  science  is  that  going  on  in 
the  field  of  applied  politics.  Avoiding  abstract  principles  and  a  priori  specu- 
lation, it  addresses  itself  to  examination  of  the  actual  organization  of  public 
authority  and  of  the  way  in  which  governmental  function  is  carried  out.  In 
'The  Government  of  European  Cities'  (Macmillan),  Prof.  William  Bennett 
Munro  of  Harvard  has  made  a  valuable  addition  to  this  literature.  He  gives 
a  detailed  account  of  the  way  in  which  municipal  government  is  formed  and 
carried  on  in  France,  Germany,  and  England.  The  style  is  clear,  straightfor- 
ward, and  unpretentious,  and  the  treatment  is  steadily  confined  to  the  subject 
in  hand  without  any  attempt  to  point  a  moral  or  aid  a  cause.  At  the  same 
time  references  to  American  municipal  methods  frequently  occur  as  incidents 
of  the  explanation  of  European  procedure,  and  these  add  to  the  value  of  the 
book  for  American  readers.  The  writing,  while  succinct,  is  copious  in  detail, 
and  only  administrative  experts  in  the  countries  respectively  considered  could 
check  off  all  the  statements  made ;  but  the  work  itself  affords  intrinsic  evidence 
of  its  painstaking  accuracy.  One  cannot  read  the  book  without  being  deeply 
impressed  by  the  essential  simplicity  of  the  principles  upon  which  European 
municipal  government  is  constituted." —  The  Nation. 

"  On  the  whole,  Professor  Munro 's  book  may  be  fairly  characterized  as  the 
most  useful  of  its  kind  thus  far  published,  because  it  furnishes  the  material  for 
making  comparisons  which  must  inevitably  disclose  the  true  course  of  numerous 
American  municipal  shortcomings."  —  San  Francisco  Chronicle. 

"  This  book  is  distinctly  an  addition  to  our  text-books  on  municipal  admin- 
istration, despite  the  fact  that  we  have  several  very  good  ones  already.  It  is  a 
book  which  will  prove  of  great  benefit  to  the  serious-minded  reader  interested 
in  municipal  governments ;  but  it  will  probably  be  used  mostly  as  a  reference 
or  text-book  in  colleges  and  universities." — The  American  Journal  of  Sociology. 

"  Cette  etude  est  tres  fructueuse  pour  tous  ceux  qu'int£ressent  les  questions 
de  droit  public  compared"  —  Societe  Beige  d*  Etudes  Coloniales. 

"  Dr.  Munro's  book  is  an  indispensable  one  to  the  student  of  municipal 
government  who  would  acquaint  himself  with  the  experience  of  the  world. 
He  modestly  disclaims  any  assumption  of  exhaustiveness,  but  it  certainly  gives 
us  an  admirably  clear  picture  alike  valuable  from  its  analytical,  comparative, 
and  historical  aspects."  —  The  Argonaut,  San  Francisco. 


THE   MACMILLAN   COMPANY 

Publishers  64-66  Fifth  Avenue  New  York 


Commission  Government  in 
American  Cities 

BY  ERNEST  S.  BRADFORD,  PH.D. 

Member  National  Municipal  League;  Sometime  Research  Scholar  in  Political 
Science,  University  of  Wisconsin;   Fellow  in  Political  Science, 
University  of  Pennsylvania;  Author  of  "Muni- 
cipal Gas  Lighting,"  etc. 

Half  leather,  ismo,  $f~2j  net;  by  mail,  $1.35 

Of  the  recent  developments  in  the  field  of  municipal  politics,  none  has 
attracted  more  attention  than  the  introduction  and  rapid  spread  of  the 
commission  form  of  city  government,  so  called  from  the  commission  or 
board  which  constitutes  the  governing  body. 

Under  this  plan,  the  organization  of  a  city  is  similar  to  that  of  a  busi- 
ness corporation.  This  popular  study  of  one  of  the  greatest  issues  to-day 
before  the  American  people  contains  an  account  of  the  rise  and  spread 
of  the  commission  form  of  government  and  the  results  of  its  operation  in 
Galveston,  Houston,  Des  Moines,  Cedar  Rapids,  Huntington,  Haverhill, 
and  elsewhere. 

Accompanying  this  there  is  a  critical  comparison  of  the  various  types 
of  commission  government  so  far  standing,  the  principles  involved,  a  list 
of  the  cities  that  rejected  the  plan,  as  well  as  those  which  have  adopted 
it,  and  finally  a  discussion  of  the  limitations  and  objections  urged  against 
commission  government.  There  is  thus  presented  in  this  work  the  most 
complete  and  up-to-date  history  of  this  form  of  government  and  of  its 
recent  marvelous  development  in  American  municipal  life. 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

Publishers  64-66  Fifth  Avenue  New  Tork 


A  GREAT  WORK  INCREASED  IN  VALUE 

The  American  Commonwealth 

BY  JAMES  BRYCE 
New  edition,  thoroughly  revised,  with  four  new  chapters 

Two  8vo  volumes,  $4.00  net 

"  More  emphatically  than  ever  is  it  the  most  noteworthy  treatise  on  our 
political  and  social  system." —  The  Dial. 

"The  most  sane  and  illuminating  book  that  has  been  written  on  this 
country."  —  Chicago  Tribune. 

"  What  makes  it  extremely  interesting  is  that  it  gives  the  matured  views 
of  Mr.  Bryce  after  a  closer  study  of  American  institutions  for  nearly  the 
life  of  a  generation."  —  San  Francisco  Chronicle. 

"The  work  is  practically  new  and  more  indispensable  than  ever."  — 
Boston  Herald. 

"  In  its  revised  form,  Mr.  Bryce's  noble  and  discerning  book  deserves  to 
hold  its  preeminent  place  for  at  least  twenty  years  more."  —  Record-Herald, 
Chicago,  111. 

"  Mr.  Bryce  could  scarcely  have  conferred  on  the  American  people  a 
greater  benefit  than  he  has  done  in  preparing  the  revised  edition  of  his 
monumental  and  classic  work,  'The  American  Commonwealth.'"  —  Boston 
Globe. 

"  If  the  writer  of  this  review  was  to  be  compelled  to  reduce  his  library 
of  Americana  to  five  books,  James  Bryce's  '  American  Commonwealth '  would 
be  one  of  them."  —  Evening  Telegram,  Portland,  Ore. 


THE   MACMILLAN   COMPANY 

Publishers  64-66  Fifth  Avenue  New  Tork 


The  Government  of  England 


BY  A.  LAWRENCE  LOWELL 

President  of  Harvard  University;  Formerly  Professor  of  the  Science  of 
Government;  Author  of  "Colonial  Civil  Service,"  etc. 


In  two  volumes.    Bound  in  the  style  of  Bryce's  "  American  Commonwealth  " 

New  edition.     Cloth,  8vo,  $4.00  net 

The  New  York  Sun  calls  it :  — 

"  The  remarkable  work  which  American  readers,  including  even  those  who 
suppose  themselves  to  be  pretty  well  informed,  will  find  indispensable  .  .  . ; 
it  deserves  an  honored  place  in  every  public  and  private  library  in  the  Ameri- 
can Republic."  —  M.  W.  H. 

"  Professor  Lowell's  book  will  be  found  by  American  readers  to  be  the  most 
complete  and  informing  presentation  of  its  subject  that  has  ever  fallen  in  their 
way.  .  .  .  There  is  no  risk  in  saying  that  it  is  the  most  important  and  valu- 
able study  in  government  and  politics  which  has  been  issued  since  James 
Bryce's  '  American  Commonwealth,'  and  perhaps  also  the  greatest  work  of  this 
character  produced  by  an  American  scholar." — Philadelphia  Public  Ledger. 

"  It  is  the  crowning  merit  of  the  book  that  it  is,  like  Mr.  Bryce's,  emphati- 
cally a  readable  work.  It  is  not  impossible  that  it  will  come  to  be  recognized 
as  the  greatest  work  in  this  field  that  has  ever  been  produced  by  an  American 
scholar."  —  Pittsburg  Post. 

"  The  comprehensiveness  and  range  of  Mr.  Lowell's  work  is  one  of  the 
reasons  for  the  unique  place  of  his  '  Government  of  England  '  —  for  its  place 
in  a  class  by  itself,  with  no  other  books  either  by  British  or  non-British  authors 
to  which  it  can  be  compared.  Another  reason  is  the  insight,  which  character- 
izes it  throughout,  into  the  spirit  in  which  Parliament  and  the  other  represen- 
tative institutions  of  England  are  worked,  and  the  accuracy  which  so  generally 
characterizes  definite  statements ;  all  contribute  to  make  it  of  the  highest 
permanent  value  to  students  of  political  science  the  world  over."  —  EDWARD 
PORRITT  in  The  Forum. 


THE   MACMILLAN   COMPANY 

Publishers  64-66  Fifth  Avenue  New  York 


42332 


University  of  California 

SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 

405  Hilgard  Avenue,  Los  Angeles,  CA  90024-1388 

Return  this  material  to  the  library 

from  which  it  was  borrowed. 


JUL  1 1 1336 

-  OCP  *  0  IMS" 
SEP  H1998 


000  691  942    7 


